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Foes by Mary Johnston
page 26 of 352 (07%)
youth, and he had a psychologist's interest. He said now to himself,
"There is something in his character that connects itself with, that
responds to, the idea of vengeance." There came into his memory the
laird's talk, the evening of Mr. Touris's visit, in June. Glenfernie,
who would have wrestled with Grierson of Lagg at the edge of the pit;
Glenfernie's mother and father, who might have had much the same
feeling; their forebears beyond them with like sensations toward the
Griersons of their day.... The long line of them--the long line of
mankind--injured and injurers....

"Travelers through the wood, whose voices the robbers heard,
found Ibycus the poet lying upon the ground, ravished of
life. It chanced that he had been known of them, known and
loved. Great mourning arose, and vain search for them who
had done this wrong. But those strong, wicked ones were
gone, fled from their haunts, fled from the wood afar to
Corinth, for the god Pan had thrown against them a pine
cone. So the travelers took the body of Ibycus and bore it
with them to Corinth.

"A poet had been slain upon the threshold of the house of
song. Sacred blood had spattered the white robes of a queen
dressed for jubilee. Evil unreturned to its doers must
darken the sunshine of the famous days. Corinth uttered a
cry of lamentation and wrath. 'Where are the ill-doers, the
spillers of blood, that we may spill their blood and avenge
Ibycus, showing the gods that we are their helpers?' But
those robbers and murderers might not be found. And the body
of Ibycus was consumed upon a funeral pyre.

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