THE FALSE PROPHET It was a different Amaryllis that the pretended Philadelphus faced now, from the one who had welcomed him on his arrival in Jerusalem months ago.

Then she had been so cold and self-contained that it would have been effrontery to discuss her hopes with her.

Now, with the avarice of love in her eyes, with wishfulness and defeat making their sorry signs on her face, she was a creature that even the humblest would have longed to help.
Philadelphus sat opposite her in the ivory chair which was hers by right.

She sat in the exedra and listened eagerly to the things he said with her finger-tips on her lips and her eyes gazing from under her brow as her head drooped.
She had ceased long ago to debate idly on the actual identity of the man who had called himself Hesper of Ephesus.

There was another question that absorbed her.