ul because the master
is a Roman. Say on, and quickly."

She threw his hand off and stepped back into the full light,
with all the evil of her nature collected in her eyes and voice.

"Thou drinker of lees, feeder upon husks! To think I could love
thee, having seen Messala! Such as thou were born to serve him.
He would have been satisfied with release of the six talents;
but I say to the six thou shalt add twenty--twenty, dost thou
hear? The kissings of my little finger which thou hast taken
from him, though with my consent, shall be paid for; and that I
have followed thee with affection of sympathy, and endured thee
so long, enter into the account not less because I was serving
him. The merchant here is thy keeper of moneys. If by to-morrow
at noon he has not thy order acted upon in favor of my Messala
for six-and-twenty talents--mark the sum!--thou shalt settle with
the Lord Sejanus. Be wise and--farewell."

As she was going to the door, he put himself in her way.

"The old Egypt lives in you," he said. "Whether you see Messala
to-morrow or the next day, here or in Rome, give him this message.
Tell him I have back the money, even the six talents, he robbed me
of by robbing my father's estate; tell him I survived the galleys
to which he had me sent, and in my strength rejoice in his beggary
and dishonor; tell him I think the affliction of body which he has
from my hand is the curse of our Lord God of Israel upon him more
fit than death for his crimes against the helpless; tell him my
mother and sister whom he had sent to a cell in Antonia that they
might die of leprosy, are alive and well, thanks to the power of
the Nazarene whom you so despise; tell him that, to fill my measure
of happiness, they are restored to me, and that I will go hence to
their love, and find in it more than compensation for the impure
passions which you leave me to take to him; tell him--this for
your comfort, O cunning incarnate, as much as his--tell him that
when the Lord Sejanus comes to despoil me he will find nothing;
for the inheritance I had from the duumvir, including the villa
by Misenum, has been sold, and the money from the sale is out
of reach, afloat in the marts of the world as bills of exchange;
and that this house and the goods and merchandise and the ships and
caravans with which Simonides plies his commerce with such princely
profits are covered by imperial safeguards--a wise head having found
the price of the favor, and