knew that his love was genuine. Daphne seemed the very
incarnation of desirable, artless, heart-refreshing womanliness, but his
memory could not dwell with her long; anxiety concerning Chello's report
only too quickly interrupted it, as soon as he yielded to its charm.

He did not think at all of the future. What was he to appoint for a time
which the words of a third person might render unendurable?

When Gras at last ushered in the goldsmith, his heart throbbed so
violently that it was difficult for him to find the words needed for the
questions he desired to ask.

The Egyptian had really been summoned to Alexandria by Proclus, not on
account of the Demeter, but the clasp said to belong to Myrtilus, found
amid the ruins of the fallen house, and he had been able to identify it
with absolute positiveness as the sculptor's property.

He had been referred from one office to another, until finally the
Tennis notary and Proclus opened the right doors to him.

Now the importance of his testimony appeared, since the will of the
wealthy young sculptor could not be opened until his death was proved,
and the clasp which had been found aided in doing so.

Hermon's question whether he had heard any particulars about this will
was answered by the cold-hearted, dull-brained man in the negative.

He had done enough, he said, by expressing his opinion. He had gone to
Alexandria unwillingly, and would certainly have stayed in Tennis if he
could have foreseen what a number of tiresome examinations he would
be obliged to undergo. He had been burning with impatience to quit the
place, on account of the important work left behind in Tanis, and he
did not even know whether he would be reimbursed for his travelling
expenses.

During this preliminary conversation Hermon gained the composure he
needed.

He began by ascertaining whether Chello remembered the interior
arrangement of the burned white house, and it soon appeared that he
recollected it accurately.

Then the blind man requested him to tell how the rescue of the statue
had been managed, and the account of the extremely prosaic artisan
described so clearly and practically how, on entering the burning
building, he found Myrtilus's studio already inaccessible, but the
statue of Demeter in Hermon's still uninjured, that the trustworthiness
of his story could not be doubted.

One circumstance only appeared strange, yet it was easily explained.
Instead of standing on the pedes