Lilith

When the leopardess threw herself the third time against the door, it gave way, and she darted in. We
followed, but she had already vanished. We sprang up a stair, and went all over the house, to find no one.
Darting down again, we spied a door under the stair, and got into a labyrinth of excavations. We had not gone
far, however, when we met the leopardess with the child we sought across her back.
He told us that the woman he took for his mother threw him into a hole, saying she would give him to the
leopardess. But the leopardess was a good one, and took him out.
Lilith
Following in search of the other boy, we got into the next house more easily, but to find, alas, that we were
too late: one of the savages had just killed the little captive! It consoled Lona, however, to learn which he
was, for she had been expecting him to grow a bad giant, from which worst of fates death had saved him. The
leopardess sprang upon his murderer, took him by the throat, dragged him into the street, and followed Lona
with him, like a cat with a great rat in her jaws.
"Let us leave the horrible place," said Lona; "there are no mothers here! This people is not worth delivering."
The leopardess dropped her burden, and charged into the crowd, this way and that, wherever it was thickest.
The slaves cried out and ran, tumbling over each other in heaps.
When we got back to the army, we found it as we had left it, standing in order and ready.
But I was far from easy: the princess gave no sign, and what she might be plotting we did not know! Watch
and ward must be kept the night through!
The Little Ones were such hardy creatures that they could repose anywhere: we told them to lie down with
their animals where they were, and sleep till they were called. In one moment they were down, and in another
lapt in the music of their sleep, a sound as of water over grass, or a soft wind among leaves. Their animals
slept more lightly, ever on the edge of waking. The bigger boys and girls walked softly hither and thither
among the dreaming multitude. All was still; the whole wicked place appeared at rest.
CHAPTER XXXVI. MOTHER AND DAUGHTER
Lona was so disgusted with the people, and especially with the women, that she wished to abandon the place
as soon as possible; I, on the contrary, felt very strongly that to do so would be to fail wilfully where success
was possible; and, far worse, to weaken the hearts of the Little Ones, and so bring them into much greater
danger. If we retreated, it was certain the princess would not leave us unassailed! if we encountered her, the
hope of the prophecy went with us! Mother and daughter must meet: it might be that Lona's loveliness would
take Lilith's heart by storm! if she threatened violence, I should be there between them! If I found that I had
no other power over her, I was ready, for the sake of my Lona, to strike her pitilessly on the closed hand! I
knew she was doomed: most likely it was decreed that her doom should now be brought to pass through us!
Still without hint of the relation in which she stood to the princess, I stated the case to Lona as it appeared to
me. At once she agreed to accompany me to the palace.
>From the top of one of its great towers, the princess had, in the early morning, while the city yet slept,
descried the approach of the army of the Little Ones. The sight awoke in her an over−mastering terror: she
had failed in her endeavour to destroy them, and they were upon her! The prophecy was about to be fulfilled!
When she came to herself, she descended to the black hall, and seated herself in the north focus of the ellipse,
under the opening in the roof.
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