ed on sending her,
Eudoxia, away with her granddaughter to enjoy better air under the roof
of a friend of the leech's; they were to go this very day, or to-morrow
at latest.

Orion was disagreeably startled by this intelligence. He had not expected
that Philippus would come so early, and he himself had been the first to
promote a scheme which now no longer seemed advisable.

"How very provoking!" he muttered between his teeth, as a slave offered
him a roast fowl and asparagus.

"Is it not? And perhaps we shall have to go quite far into the country,"
said the Greek, with a languishing look, as she drew one of the long
stems between her teeth.

The words and the glance made Orion feel as if he grudged the old fool
the good food she was eating, and his voice was not particularly
ingratiating as he replied that town and country were all the same, the
only point was which would be best for the child. When he went on to say
that he was quitting home next evening, Eudoxia cried out, let a stick of
asparagus drop in her lap, and said despairingly: "Oh, then everything is
at an end!"

He, however, interposed reproachfully: "On the contrary, then your duty
begins; you must devote yourself wholly and exclusively to the child. You
know that her own grandmother is averse to her. Give her your best
affection, as you have already begun to do, be a mother to her; and if
you really are my well-wisher, show it in that way. For my part you will
find me grateful, and not in words alone. Go tomorrow to the treasurer's
office; Nilus will give you the only thing by which I can at present
prove my gratitude. Do your best to cherish the child; I have taken care
to provide for your old age."

He rose, cutting short the Greek's profuse expressions of thanks, and
betook himself to his mother. She was still in her room; however, he now
sent word that he had come to see her, and she was ready to admit him,
having expected that he would come even sooner.

She was reclining, half-sitting, on a divan in her cool and shady
bedroom, and she at once told her son of her determination to follow the
physician's advice and entrust the little girl to his friend. She spoke
in a tone of sleepy indifference; but as soon as Orion opposed her and
begged her to keep Mary at home, she grew more lively, and looking him
wrathfully in the face exclaimed: "Can you wish that? How can you ask
me?" and she went on in repining lamentation:

"Everything is changed n