Theophilus had also quitted the scene with the Comes, leaving the work of devastation in the competent hands of the monks.  He knew his skin-clad adherents well; and he knew that within a very few days not an idol, not a picture, not a token would remain intact to preserve the memory of the old gods; a thousand slaves charged to sweep the Serapeum from the face of the earth would have given his impatience twenty times as long to wait.  The Comes went off at once to the Hippodrome, preceded by hundreds who had hurried off to tell the assembled multitude that Alexandria had lost her god.

Constantine, however, had not left the temple; he had withdrawn into one of the aisles and seated himself on the steps, where he remained, sunk in thought and gazing at the ground.  He was a soldier and took service and discipline in earnest.  What he had done he had been forced to do; but no one could guess how hard it had been to him to fulfil this terrible duty.  His own act was abominable in his eyes, and yet he would have done it again to-morrow, if it had again been required of him under similar circumstances.  He bewailed the beautiful statue as a lost treasure of art; but he felt that it was indispensable that it should perish out of the world.  And at the same time he thought of Gorgo, wondering how she—­who had only the day before pledged herself to him, whom he loved with fervent passion, to whom, as he well knew, his faith was something monstrous in its contempt for beauty—­would bear to learn that he, her lover, was the man who, like some coarse barbarian, had defaced this noble work and ruined this vision of beauty, no less dear to him than it was to her.  Still, as he sat brooding and searching the very depths of his soul, he could not help feeling that he had certainly acted rightly and would do the same again, even at the risk of losing her.  To him Gorgo, was the noblest of God’s creatures, and how could he have borne to go through life at her side with a stain on his honor?  But he did not conceal from himself the fact that his deed had opened a wide gulf between them; and it was with deep pathos that his thoughts recurred to the antique conception of tragedy—­of fate which pursues its innocent victims as though they were guilty.  This day perhaps would witness the sunset of his life’s joy, would drive him forth once more to war—­to fight, and do nothing but fight, till death should meet him on the battle-field.  And as he sat there his eyes grew dim and heavy and his head fell on his heaving breast.

Suddenly he felt a light touch on his shoulder, and turning round, he saw Gorgo standing with her hand outstretched; he started to his feet, seized it with eager passion and looking sadly into the young girl’s eyes said, with deep emotion: 

“I would I might hold this hand forever—­but you will leave me, you will turn from me when I tell you of the deed that mine has done.”

“I know it,” she said firmly.  “And it was a hard task even for you—­a painful duty—­was it not?”