ill this new passion lead you? The horses are stamping
impatiently outside; duty summons the most faithful of men, and he stands
like a prophet, indulging in mysterious sayings!"

"Whose meaning and purport, spite of your calm calculations of existing
circumstances, will soon seem no less wonderful to you than to me, whose
unruly artist nature, according to your opinion, is playing me a trick,"
retorted the architect. "Now listen to this explanation: Didymus's house
will be occupied at once by my workmen, but I shall examine the lower
rooms of the Temple of Isis. I have with me a document requiring
obedience to my orders. Cleopatra herself laid the plans before me, even
the secret portion showing the course of the subterranean chambers. It
will cast some light upon my mysterious sayings if I bear you away from
the enemy through one of the secret corridors. They were right in
concealing from you by how slender a thread, spite of the power of your
example in mathematics, the sword hangs above your head. Now that I see a
possibility of removing it, I can show it to you. Tomorrow you would have
fallen, without hope of rescue, into the hands of cruel foes and been
shamefully abandoned by your own weak uncle, had not the most implacable
of all your enemies permitted himself the infamous pleasure of laying
hands on an old man's house, and the Queen, in consequence of an
agitating message, had the idea suggested of building her own mausoleum.
The corridor"--here he lowered his voice--"of which I spoke leads to the
sea at a spot close beside Didymus's garden, and through it I will guide
you, and, if possible, Barine also, to the shore. This could be
accomplished in the usual way only by the greatest risk. If we use the
passage we can reach a dark place on the strand unseen, and unless some
special misfortune pursues us our flight will be unnoticed. The litters
and your tottering gait would betray everything if we were to enter the
boat anywhere else in the great harbour."

"And we, sensible folk, refuse to believe in miracles!" cried Dion,
holding out his wan hand to the architect. "How shall I thank you, you
dear, clever, most loyal of friends to your male friends, though your
heart is so faithless to fair ones? Add that malicious speech to the
former ones, for which I now crave your pardon. What you intend to
accomplish for Barine and me gives you a right to do and say to me
whatever ill you choose all the rest of my life. Anx