Back she went again to the bed, kneeling down beside Leo, and in the
intense silence which followed--for he had ceased his mutterings--I
thought that I could hear the beating of her heart. Now she began to
speak, very low and in that same bastard Greek tongue, mixed here and
there with Mongolian words such as are common to the dialects of Central
Asia. I could not hear or understand all she said, but some sentences I
did understand, and they frightened me not a little.
"Man of my dreams," she murmured, "whence come you? Who are you? Why did
the Hesea bid me to meet you?" Then some sentences I could not catch.
"You sleep; in sleep the eyes are opened. Answer, I bid you; say what
is the bond between you and me? Why have I dreamt of you? Why do I know
you? Why----?" and the sweet, rich voice died slowly from a whisper into
silence, as though she were ashamed to utter what was on her tongue.
As she bent over him a lock of her hair broke loose from its jewelled
fillet and fell across his face. At its touch Leo seemed to wake, for
he lifted his gaunt, white hand and touched the hair, then said in
English--"Where am I? Oh! I remember;" and their eyes met as he strove
to lift himself and could not. Then he spoke again in his broken,
stumbling Greek, "You are the lady who saved me from the water. Say, are
you also that queen whom I have sought so long and endured so much to
find?"
"I know not," she answered in a voice as sweet as honey, a low,
trembling voice; "but true it is I am a queen--if a Khania be a queen.
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