Gorgo had looked lovingly at him while he spoke, and he, pressing her
hand to his lips went on with ardent feeling:

"Yes, you shall be mine--I dare, and I will go to ask you of your father.
There are some words spoken in one's life which can never be forgotten.
Once your father said that he wished that I was his son. On the march,
in camp, in battle, wherever I have wandered, those words have been in my
mind; for me they could have but one meaning: I would be his son--I shall
be his son when Gorgo is my wife!--And now the time has come . . ."

"Not yet, not to-day," she interrupted eagerly. "My hopes are the same
as yours. I believe with you that our love can bring all that is
sweetest into our lives. What you believe I must believe, and I will
never urge upon you the things that I regard as holiest. I can give up
much, bear much, and it will all seem easy for your sake. We can agree,
and settle what shall be conceded to your Christ and what to our gods--
but not to-day; not even to-morrow. For the present let me first carry
out the task I have undertaken--when that is done and past, then... You
have my heart, my love; but if I were to prove a deserter from the cause
to-day or to-morrow it would give others--Olympius--a right to point at
me with scorn."

"What is it then that you have undertaken?" asked Constantine with grave
anxiety.

"To crown and close my past life. Before I can say: I am yours, wholly
yours . . ."

"Are you not mine now, to-day, at once?" he urged.