tears, which have turned into stone, and I ask you humbly: punish me and give me a penance to do. Look! I have lost my wings. I may not go naked any longer. I have committed sin. Emeralda, make me do penance! Inflict on me the heaviest that you can think of. If I can do it, I will do it. Lay a heavy task upon my wingless shoulders.”
Emeralda looked down at kneeling Psyche. The princess approached her sister, took the jewels, examined them attentively, held them up to the light of the candles, and then dropped them into an open casket. Thoughtfully she continued gazing at Psyche. And she seemed to Psyche like a gigantic jewel-spider, watching from the midst of her glittering web the rays of her own splendour. But whatever she were, princess, sun, spider, or jewel, a woman she was not, a human being she was not, and through the opal of her bosom gleamed her heart of ruby.
Psyche, kneeling penitent, spoke not, awaiting her fate, and Emeralda watched her.
Thoughts, mechanical as wheels, rolled through her brain. She thought as a machine. She was inexorable, because she had no feeling;
