ANALYTIKOS. The soldiers of the King will give you faith. Don't
you know that it means death for any man to enter the apartments
of the Queen?
PARIS [looking from one to the other]. Oh! So you're a couple of
eunuchs.
[Though nearly eighty this is too much for ANALYTIKOS to bear. He
rushes to call the guards, but MENELAUS stops him.]
PARIS [to ANALYTIKOS]. Thanks.
ANALYTIKOS. You thank me for telling you your doom?
PARIS. No -- for convincing me that I'm where I want to be. It's
taken me a long while, but I knew I'd get here. [And then very
intimately to MENELAUS.] Where's the Queen?
MENELAUS. Where do you come from?
PARIS. From the hills. I had come down into the market-place to
sell my sheep. I had my hood filled with apples. They were
golden-red like a thousand sunsets.
MENELAUS [annoyed]. You might skip those bucolic details.
PARIS. At the fair I met three ancient gypsies.
MENELAUS. What have they to do with you coming here?
PARIS. You don't seem very patient. Can't I tell my story in my
own way? They asked me for the apple I was eating and I asked
them what they'd give for it.
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