Now he would
see of what colour were her eyes.

The young witch Diadyomene leaned forward from a rock, and smiled at the
white body's beauty lying in the pool below. She was happy, quivering to
the finger-tips with live malice; and the image at her feet, of all
things under heaven, gave her dearest encouragement. Her boulder shelved
into a hollow good for enthronement, draped and cushioned with a shag of
weed. There she leant sunning in the ardent rays; there she drew coolness
about her, with the yet wet dark ribbons of seaweed from throat to ankle
tempering her flesh anew. No man could have spied her then.

By a flight of startled sea-birds, he nears. She casts off that drapery.
Through the gorge comes Christian, dripping, and stands at gaze.

With half-shut eyes, with mirth at heart, she lay motionless for him to
discern and approach. She noted afresh, well pleased, his stature and
comely proportions; and as he neared, his ruddy tan, his singular fair
hair and eyes, she marked with no distaste. The finer the make of this
creature, the finer her triumph in its ruin.

He came straight opposite, till only the breadth of water at her feet was
between.

'Why has "Diadyomene, Diadyomene" summoned me?' he said.

Against the dark setting of olive weed her moist skin glistened
marvellously white in the sun. A gaze grave and direct meeting his could
not reconcile him to the sight of such beauty bare and unshrinking. He
dropped self-conscious eyes; they fell upon the same nude limbs mirrored
in the water below. There he saw her lips making answer.

'I sent you no summons.'

Christian looked up astonished, and an 'Oh' of unmistakable satisfaction
escaped him that surprised and stung the young witch. He stood at fault
and stammered, discountenanced, an intruder requiring excuse.

'A seagull cried your name, and winged me through the reefs to shore, and
led me here.'

'I sent you no summons,' she repeated.

A black surmise flashed that the white bird was her familiar, doing her
bidding once, this time compassing independent mischief. Then his face
burned as the sense of the reiteration reached his wits: she meant to
tell him that he lied. Confounded, he knew not how to justify himself to
her. There, below his downcast eyes, her reflected face waited, quite
emotionless. Suddenly her eyes met his: she had looked by way of his
reflection to encounter them. Down to the mirror she dipped one foot, and
sent ripples to blot o