Soft dusk and quiet proved that the doors of Amaryllis had been shut upon unhappy Jerusalem.
The second servant drew a cord and a roller of matting lifted and showed a skylight.

Philadelphus the pretender was in the andronitis of a Greek house.
It was typical.

None but a Greek with the purest taste had planned it.
Walls and pavement were of unpolished marble, lusterless white.

A marble exedra built in a semicircle sat in the farther end, facing a chair wholly of ivory set beside a lectern of dull brass.

At either end of the exedra on a pedestal formed by the arms, a brass staff upheld a flat lamp that cast its luster down on the seat by night.
Against an opposite wall built at full length of the hall, was a pigeonholed case, which was stacked with brass cylinders.