I implore
you to grant me a brief interview. Not a word, not a look shall betray
the passion within and which threatens to destroy me.

"You must on no account fail to read what follows, since it is of no
small real importance even to you. In the first place restitution must be
made to you of all of your inheritance which the deceased was able to
rescue and to add to by his fatherly stewardship. In these agitated times
it will be a matter of some difficulty to invest this capital safely and
to good advantage. Consider: just as the Arabs drove out the Byzantines,
the Byzantines might drive them out again in their turn. The Persians,
though stricken to the earth, the Avars, or some other people whose very
name is as yet unknown to history, may succeed our present rulers, who,
only ten years since, were regarded as a mere handful of unsettled
camel-drivers, caravan-leaders, and poverty-stricken desert-tribes. The
safety of your fortune would be less difficult to provide for if, as was
formerly the case here, we could entrust it to the merchants of
Alexandria. But one great house after another is being ruined there, and
all security is at an end. As to hiding or burying your possessions, as
most Egyptians do in these hard times, it is impossible, for the same
reason as prevents our depositing it on interest in the state
land-register. You must be able to get it at the shortest notice; since
you might at some time wish to quit Egypt in haste with all your
possessions.

"These are matters with which a woman cannot be familiar. I would
therefore propose that you should leave the arrangement of them to us
men; to Philippus, the physician, Rufinus, your host--who is, I am
assured, an honest man--and to our experienced and trustworthy treasurer
Nilus, whom you know as an incorruptible judge.

"I propose that the business should be settled tomorrow in the house of
Rufinus. You can be present or not, as you please. If we men agree in our
ideas I beg you--I beseech you to grant me an interview apart. It will
last but a few minutes, and the only subject of discussion will be a
matter--an exchange by which you will recover something you value and
have lost, and grant me I hope, if not your esteem, at any rate a word of
forgiveness. I need it sorely, believe me, Paula; it is as indispensable
to me as the breath of life, if I am to succeed in the work I have begun
on myself. If you have prevailed on yourself to read through this lette