One spring, and the ponderous cover flew back.

The toga, the innocent cause of the catastrophe, lay on the chair close at hand.

Agias grasped the whole picture in a twinkling: Sesostris lying beside a heavy wooden bench, with blood flowing from a great wound in his head which had struck in falling on a sharp corner; Artemisia crying in unspeakable dread on a divan; Pratinas, his face black as night, with uplifted hand prepared to strike a second time.

Agias saw; and while he saw acted.

Down over Pratinas's head dashed the broad linen folds of the toga, and two muscular arms drew it tight around the neck.