of water, and out of the purple-tinted depths rose the white,
nude, lovely form of a woman, whose rounded, outstretched arms
appeared to beckon them, . . whose mouth smiled in mingled malice
and sweetness, . . and round whose looped-up tresses sparkled a
diadem of sapphire flame. With a cry of astonishment and ecstacy
Theos sprang forward: Sah-luma held him back in laughing
remonstrance.

"Wilt drown for a statue's sake?" he inquired mirthfully. "By my
soul, good Theos, if thy wits thus wander at sight of a witching,
marble nymph illumed by electric glamours, what will become of
thee when thou art face to face with living, breathing loveliness!
Come, thou hotheaded neophyte! thou shalt not waste thy passion on
images of stone, I warrant thee! Come!"

But Theos stood still. His eyes roved from Sah-luma to the
glittering statue and from the statue back again to Sah-luma in
mingled doubt and dread. A vague foreboding filled his mind, he
fancied that a bevy of mocking devils peered at him from out the
wooded labyrinth, ... and that Sin was the name of the white siren
yonder, whose delicate body seemed to palpitate with every slow
ripple of the surrounding waters. He hesitated,--with that often
saving hesitation a noble spirit may feel ere willfully yielding
to what it instinctively knows to be wrong,--and for the briefest
possible space an imperceptible line was drawn between his own
self-consciousness and the fascinating personality of his lately
found friend--a line that parted them asunder as though by a gulf
of centuries.

"Sah-luma," he said, in a tremulous, low tone, "tell me truly,--is