“Rebels!” I cried. “Who are hammering at the gates of Atlantis? Is the
city in a state of siege?”
“Of their condescension,” said Phorenice lightly, “they are giving us
holiday to-day, and so, happily, my welcome to you comes undisturbed.
If they were fighting, your ears would have told you of it. To give them
their due, they are noisy enough in all their efforts. My spies say they
are making ready new engines for use against the walls, which you may
sally out to-morrow and break if it gives you amusement. But for to-day,
Deucalion, I have you, and you have me, and there is peace round us, and
some prettiness of display. If you ask for more I will give it you.”
“I did not know of this rebellion,” I said, “but as Your Majesty has
made me your minister, it is well that I should know all about its scope
at once. This is a matter we should be serious upon.”
“And do you think I cannot take it seriously also?” she retorted.
“Ylga,” she said to the girl that stood behind, “set loose my dress at
the shoulder.”
And when the attendant had unlinked the jewelled clasp (as it seemed to
me with a very ill grace), she herself stripped down the fabric, baring
the pure skin beneath, and showing me just below the curve of the left
breast a bandage of bloodstained linen.
“There is a guarantee of my seriousness yesterday, at any rate,” she
said, looking at me sidelong. “The arrow struck on a rib and that saved
me. If it had struck between, Deucalion would have been standing beside
my funeral pyre to-day instead of riding on this pretty steed of mine
which he admires so much. Your eye seems to feast itself most on the
mammoth, Deucalion. Ah, poor me. I am not one of your shaggy creatures,
and so it seems I shall never be able to catch your regard. Ylga,” she
said to the girl behind, “you may link my dress up again with its clasp.
My Lord Deucalion has seen wounds before, and there is nothing else here
to interest him.”