Sardou's Cleopatra — page 188: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

SARDOU’S CLEOPATRA. 173 For a moment or two all was silence, and then a tearing, cutting sound was heard, the gleam of a dagger was visible slashing through the sidcs of the rug, and from its folds emerged Cleopatra. As once, years before, she had been borne into the presence of Czesar, so-now, in the same man- ner, had she eluded the guards and gained en- trance to Antony. | Flushed and rosy, she stood for a moment breathless from her confinement, and then, step- ping out from the heavy rug which lay about her feet, she advanced curiously to the door. ‘There she listened for.a moment, and then looked round for a place to hide, in case she should be sur- prised by any other than Antony. In one corner was a low bed, draped with heavy silken curtains. She unloosened the curtains, and stood there silently waiting, her exquisite figure, in its white robes, outlined against the dark back- eround of the draperies. ‘The struggle was close at hand, but she had no fear of the result; and her lip curled with a sort of self-contempt as she remembered the feelings with which she had watched the boat and its occupant, the Roman matron, that paragon of all the virtues, Octavia! “‘cComicbooks co