perately did
he defend his wish to do so; and as he fought for the thing he desired,
it acquired in his eyes a semblance of necessity and a number of reasons
suggested themselves which made it appear both justifiable and easy of
attainment.

There was money in hand; after Arsinoe's being chosen for the part of
Roxana he might expect to be able to borrow more; it was his duty to
appear with due dignity that he might not scare off the illustrious
son-in-law of whom he dreamed, and in the extremity of need he could
still fall back on his collection of rarities. The only thing was to
find the right purchaser; for, if the sword of Antony had brought him
so much, what would not some amateur give him for the other, far more
valuable, objects.

Arsinoe turned red and white as her father referred again and again to
the bargain she had made; but she dared not confess the truth, and she
rued her falsehood all the more bitterly the more clearly she saw with
her own sound sense, that the Honor which had fallen upon her yesterday,
threatened to develop all her father's weaknesses in an absolutely fatal
manner.

To-day she would have been amply satisfied with pleasing Pollux, and she
would, without a regret have transferred to another her part with
all the applause and admiration it would procure her, and which, only
yesterday, had seemed to her so inestimably precious. This she said; but
Keraunus would not take the assertion in earnest, laughed in her face,
went off into mysterious allusions to the wealth which could not fail to
come into the house and--since an obscure consciousness told him that
it would be becoming him to prove that it was not solely personal vanity
and self-esteem that influenced all his proceedings--he explained that
he had made up his mind to a great sacrifice and would be content on the
coming occasion to wear his gilt fillet and not buy a pure gold one.
By this act of self-denial he fancied he had acquired a full right to
devote a very pretty little sum to the acquisition of a fine-looking
slave. Arsinoe's entreaties were unheeded, and when she began to cry
with grief at the prospect of losing her old house-mate he forbid her
crossly to shed a tear for such a cause, for it was very childish,
and he would not be pleased to conduct her with red eyes to meet the
prefect's wife.

During the course of this argument his hair had got itself duly curled,
and he now desired Arsinoe to arrange her own hair nicely