“Don’t talk that way, Helen; it hurts. I confess I’m old-fashioned. I like the old ways of men and women.”

“Adraste likes them, too,” said Helen. “She seems to have met a friend at the end of your garden. He’s been talking with her most confidentially, not to say affectionately, for the last fifteen minutes.”

“Kind gods!” cried Charitas, “that’s my boy Damastor! There, I told you, Helen, I told you!”

VII

Hermione was Helen’s child, but Menelaus was her father. She had his dark hair, his black eyes, and his kind of regal bearing. She had the manner of knowing who she was. Helen was queenly by birth, Hermione by inheritance. She was not beautiful herself, but she called beauty to mind, and she had an admirable character. The world, she thought, might be set straight by intelligence and resolution. She was disposed to do her part. She stood before Helen now, tall and slender, much at ease, wondering why her mother had sent for her.

“Hermione, I find certain scandalous rumours circulating about me here in Sparta. Perhaps you can explain them.”

“Which do you refer to, mother?”

“So you have heard of them. I must know their source, if possible, in order to stop them. Scandal is always annoying, and usually it is unnecessary.”

“At times, mother, it is inevitable.”

“Never,” said Helen. “I’ve met people who thought so, but I don’t share their view. In any case, the question hardly concerns us. I wish to get at the bottom of these stories in which I figure rather discreditably. When did they first come to your attention?”

“I’d rather forget than talk about them, mother.”

“We’ll dispose of them first and forget them afterwards,” said Helen. “Since there are several of these stories, which did you hear of first, and when?”

“There’s the legend,” said Hermione, “that you deserted your husband and ran away with Paris to Troy. I first heard of it immediately after you went.”

“But that’s not scandal,” said Helen, “that’s the truth.”

“If that’s not scandal, I don’t know what it is.”

“I see you don’t,” said her mother. “In scandal there’s always some falsehood, something malicious and defamatory. Scandal, to my mind, is such a story as I heard yesterday afternoon from Charitas. She says I never was at Troy at all. Paris carried me off, against my will, and some valuable furniture, too. The winds blew us to Egypt—you know the absurd tale? Well, that’s what I call scandal. What should I be doing in Egypt? And should I have gone off with Paris if he had been a thief?”

“The furniture was missing,” said Hermione, “and you must admit, mother, Paris was the natural one to blame, since he—well, he did—what he did.”

“What did he do?” asked Helen. “You were an infant at the time; I’d like to hear your account of the episode. Perhaps you supplied the malicious part of the scandal. Paris didn’t steal me, as you were about to say, I was quite willing. But if he had stolen me, I’d prefer to think he would have had no margin of interest left for the furniture.”