DAPHNE
week. Whether she was too happy or too unhappy she could not tell: she only knew that she was restless and smothering for air and space. Hastily dressing, she had stolen on tiptoe down the broad stairway by the running water and out into the night, carrying a tiny Greek lamp with a single flame, clear, as only the flame of olive oil can be. She had put the lamp down in the doorway, and it was burning there now, a beacon to guide her footsteps when she wanted to return. Meanwhile, the air was cool on throat and forehead and on her open palms: she had no wish to go in.
Here was a fountain whose jets of water, blown high from the mouths of merry dolphins, fell in spray in a great stone basin where mermaids waited for the shower to touch bare shoulders and bended heads. The murmur of the water, mingled with the murmur of unseen live things, and the melody of night touched the girl's discordant thoughts to music. Of what
130
