and of power and of fame. Their dreams are the futile frenzies."

"Dreams!" Lucretius interrupted. Clodia shrank a little from the
strange look in his eyes. "Do you, too, dream at night? I worked late
last night, struggling to fit into Latin words ideas no Latin mind
ever had. Toward morning I fell asleep and then I seemed to be borne
over strange seas and rivers and mountains and to be crossing plains
on foot and to hear strange noises. These waked me at last and I sprang
up and walked out into the Campagna where the dawn was fresh and cool.
But all day I have scarcely felt at home. And I may dream again
to-night. This time my dead may appear to me. They often do." He
walked toward her suddenly and his eyes seemed to bore into hers.
"Do you ever dream of your dead?" A horrible fright took possession
of her. She fell back against the Venus, her sea-green dress rippling
upon the white marble, and covered her eyes with her hands. When she
looked again, Lucretius was gone.

How terrible he had been to-day! Dream of the dead, he had said, the
dead! And why had he talked of _a hidden poison of which men might
sicken and die_? She felt a silly desire to shriek, to strike her
head against the painted wall, to tear the jewels from her ears. The
orange cat arched its back and rubbed its head against her. She kicked
it fiercely, and its snarl of pain seemed to bring her to her senses.
She picked the creature up and stroked it. The bird in the cage broke
into a mad little melody. How morbid she was growing! She had been
depressed by her ridiculous dinner and Lucretius had been most
unpleasant. He was such a fool, too, in his idea of love. The brevity
of the heated hours was the flame's best fuel. Venus the Plunderer
seemed to smile, and there quickened within her the desire for
excitement, for the exercise of power, for the obliterating