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This blow shattered the anchorite's patience, and, no longer master of himself, he exclaimed, "You shall answer to me for this!" and before a third and fourth call had come from Sirona's lips, he had grasped the artist's slender body, and with a mighty swing he flung him backwards over his own broad and powerful shoulders on to the stony ground.
She could not indeed bring herself to believe in Sirona's guilt at all, for she was heartily well disposed towards her; besides though it, no doubt, was not right her motherly vanity inclined her to believe that if the handsome young woman had indeed sinned, she would have preferred her fine tall Polykarp whose roses and flaming glances she blamed in all sincerity to this shaggy, wild-looking graybeard.
She could not indeed bring herself to believe in Sirona's guilt at all, for she was heartily well disposed towards her; besides though it, no doubt, was not right her motherly vanity inclined her to believe that if the handsome young woman had indeed sinned, she would have preferred her fine tall Polykarp whose roses and flaming glances she blamed in all sincerity to this shaggy, wild-looking graybeard.
He looked round, undecided, and seeking a hiding-place for it, but two sharp eyes had already detected him and his small burden from the height above him; before he had found a suitable place, stones were rolling and crashing down from the cliff to the right of the cavern, and at the same time a man came springing down with rash boldness from rock to rock, and without heeding the warning voice of the anchorite, flung himself down the slope, straight in front of him, exclaiming, while he struggled for breath and his face was hot with hatred and excitement: "That I know it well-that is Sirona's greyhound where is its mistress?
Sirona laughed out loud and exclaimed, much amused and altogether diverted from her train of thought, "To be sure. You ought to be a soldier. How well it suits you! Take off your nasty sheepskin, and let us see how the anchorite looks as a centurion." Hermas needed no second telling; he decked himself in the Gaul's armor with Sirona's help.
In a moment she had a basin at hand, and was carefully bathing the wounds in Sirona's feet; while she was wrapping the injured foot in strips of linen Dorothea came up to them. "I would," she said, "that Polykarp were only here now, this roll would suffice to bind you both."
You may save your strength." "There is plenty of it, and I need not be stingy of it," answered Hermas, and he bent forward for another powerful stroke. About half-way he took a rest, and admired the reflection of the moon in the bright mirror of the water, and he could not but think of Petrus' court-yard that had shone in the same silvery light when he had climbed up to Sirona's window.
Sirona laughed out loud and exclaimed, much amused and altogether diverted from her train of thought, "To be sure. You ought to be a soldier. How well it suits you! Take off your nasty sheepskin, and let us see how the anchorite looks as a centurion." Hermas needed no second telling; he decked himself in the Gaul's armor with Sirona's help.
Just in front of Sirona's window lay the steinbock; she hastily touched it with her slender naked toes, but quickly withdrew her foot with a shudder, for it had touched the beast's fresh wound, wet with its blood. She rapidly drew the conclusion that: he had killed it, and had thrown it down here, and that he could not be far off.
When she reopened them she saw Sirona's face with crimson cheeks, turned towards her husband; she was unhurt but Hermas? "'That is his blood!" she thought with anguish, and a voice seemed to scream in her very heart, "I, his murderess, have shed it."
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