me better than that the maiden should succeed in escaping that fate. But
--the time is short, and I must be brief--the emperor is our guest, and
honors me with boundless confidence. Just now he disclosed to me his
determination to make Melissa his wife, and I was forced to approve it.
Thus he looks to me to carry out his wishes; and if the maiden escapes,
and there falls on you, or, through you, on me, the shadow of a suspicion
of having assisted in her flight, he will have every right to regard me
as a traitor and to treat me as such. To others my life is made sacred
by my high office, but the man to whom a human life--no matter whose--is
no more than that of a sacrificial animal is to you or me, that man would
shed the blood of us both without a quiver of the eyelid."

"Then let him!" cried Euryale, hotly. "My bereaved and worn-out life is
but a small price to pay for that of an innocent, blameless creature,
glowing with youth and all the happiness of requited love, and with a
right to the highest joys that life can offer."

"And I?" exclaimed Timotheus, angrily. "What am I to you since the death
of our child? For the sake of the first person that came to you as a
poor substitute for our lost daughter, you are ready to go to your death,
and to drag me with you into the gloom of Hades. There speaks the
Christian! Even that gentle philosopher on the throne, Marcus Aurelius,
was disgusted at your fellow-believers' hideous mania for death. The
Christian expects in the next world all that is denied to him in this.
But we think of this life, in which the Deity has placed us. To me life
is the highest blessing, and yours is dearer to me than my own. Therefore
I say, firmly and decidedly: Melissa must not make her escape from this
house. If she is determined to fly this night, let her do so--I shall
not hinder her. If your counsel is of service to her, I am glad; but she
must not enter this house again after the performance in the Circus,