-that the same Jew is the richest man in the East--nay,
in all the empire. The fishes of the Tiber would have fattening
other than that they dig out of its ooze, would they not? And
while they were feeding--ha! son of Hur!--what splendor there
would be on exhibition in the Circus! Amusing the Roman people
is a fine art; getting the money to keep them amused is another
art even finer; and was there ever an artist the equal of the
Lord Sejanus?"

Ben-Hur was not too much stirred by the evident baseness of the
woman for recollection. Not unfrequently when all the other
faculties are numb and failing memory does its offices with
the greatest fidelity. The scene at the spring on the way to the
Jordan reproduced itself; and he remembered thinking then that
Esther had betrayed him, and thinking so now, he said calmly as
he could,

"To give you pleasure, daughter of Egypt, I acknowledge your
cunning, and that I am at your mercy. It may also please you to
hear me acknowledge I have no hope of your favor. I could kill you,
but you are a woman. The Desert is open to receive me; and though
Rome is a good hunter of men, there she would follow long and far
before she caught me, for in its heart there are wildernesses of
spears as well as wildernesses of sand, and it is not unlovely
to the unconquered Parthian. In the toils as I am--dupe that I
have been--yet there is one thing my due: who told you all you
know about me? In flight or captivity, dying even, there will
be consolation in leaving the traitor the curse of a man who has
lived knowing nothing but wretchedness. Who told you all you know
about me?"

It might have been a touch of art, or might have been sincere--that
as it may--the expression of the Egyptian's face became sympathetic.

"There are in my country, O son of Hur," she said, presently,
"workmen who make pictures by gathering vari-colored shells
here and there on the sea-shore after storms, and cutting
them up, and patching the pieces as inlaying on marble slabs.
Can you not see the hint there is in the practice to such as go
searching for secrets? Enough that from this person I gathered a
handful of little circumstances, and from that other yet another
handful, and that afterwhile I put them together, and was happy as
a woman can be who has at disposal the fortune and life of a man
whom"--she stopped, and beat the floor with her foot, and looked
away as if to hide a sudden emotion from him; with an air of even