d the
son of my Satabus!"

While speaking, her head nodded swiftly up and down, and when at last
she bowed it wearily, her visitors heard her murmur the names of Satabus
and Hanno, sometimes tenderly, sometimes mournfully.

Finally she asked whether any one else was concerned in Ledscha's
flight; and when she learned that a Gallic bridge-builder accompanied
the fugitive wife, she again started up as if frantic, exclaiming: "Yes,
to Nemesis with the gold! We neither need nor want it, and Satabus, my
son, he will bless me for renunciation--"

Here exhaustion again silenced her. She gazed mutely and thoughtfully
into vacancy, until at last, turning to Bias, she began more calmly:
"You will see her again, man, and must tell her what the clan of Tabus
bought with her talents. Take her my curse, and let her know that
her friends would be my foes, and her foes should find in Tabus a
benefactress!"

Then, deeply buried in thought, she again fixed her eyes on the floor;
but at last she called to Hermon, saying: "You, blind Greek--am I not
right?--the torch was thrust into your face, and you lost the sight of
both eyes?"

The artist assented to this question; but she bade him sit down before
her, and when he bent his face near her she raised one lid after the
other with trembling fingers, yet lightly and skilfully, gazed long
and intently into his eyes, and murmured: "Like black Psoti and lawless
Simeon, and they are both cured."

"Can you restore me?" Hermon now asked in great excitement. "Answer
me honestly, you experienced woman! Give me back my sight, and demand
whatever gold and valuables I still possess--"

"Keep them," Tabus contemptuously interrupted. "Not for gold or goods
will I restore you the best gift man can lose. I will cure you because
you are the person to whom the infamous wretch most ardently wished the
sorest trouble. When she hoped to destroy you, she perceived in this
deed the happiness which had been promised to her on a night when
the full moon was shining. To-day--this very night--the disk
between Astarte's horns rounds again, and presently--wait a little
while!--presently you shall have what the light restores you--" Then she
called the Biamite woman, ordered her to bring the medicine chest, and
took from it one vessel after another. The box she was seeking was
among the last and, while handing it to Bias, she muttered: "Oh, yes,
certainly--it does one good to destroy a foe, but no less to make