Ione sobbed, but answered not.

“Speak!” he demanded.

“It is—­it is!”

“Then hear me,” said Arbaces, sinking his voice into a whisper. “Thou shalt go to thy tomb rather than to his arms.”

At this instant a curtain was rudely torn aside, and Glaucus and Apsecides appeared.  There was a severe struggle, which might have had a more sinister ending had not the marble head of a goddess, shaken from its column, fallen upon Arbaces as he was about to stab the Greek, and struck the Egyptian senseless to the ground.  As it was, Ione was saved, and she and her lover were then and for ever reconciled to one another.

III.—­The Love Philtre

Clodius had not spoken without warrant when he had said that Julia, the daughter of the rich merchant Diomed, thought herself in love with Glaucus.  But since Glaucus was denied to her, her thoughts were concentrated on revenge.  In this mood she sought out Arbaces, presenting herself as one loving unrequitedly, and seeking in sorrow the aid of wisdom.

“It is a love charm,” admitted Julia, “that I would seek from thy skill.  I know not if I love him who loves me not, but I know that I would see myself triumph over a rival.  I would see him who has rejected me my suitor.  I would see her whom he has preferred in her turn despised.”

Very quickly Arbaces discerned Julia’s secret, and when he heard that Glaucus and Ione were shortly to be wedded, he gladly availed himself of this opportunity to rid himself of his hated rival.  But he dealt not in love potions, he said; he would, however, take Diomed’s daughter to one who did—­the witch who dwelt on the slopes of Vesuvius.

He kept his promise; but the entire philtre given to Julia was one which went direct to the brain, and the effects of which—­for neither Arbaces nor his creature, the witch, wished to place themselves within the power of the law—­were such as caused those who witnessed them to attribute them to some supernatural agency.

But once again, though less happily than on the former occasion, Nydia was destined to be the means of thwarting the schemes of the Egyptian.  The devotion of the blind flower-girl had deepened into love for her deliverer.  She was jealous of Ione.  Now, for Julia had taken her into confidence, and both believed in the love charm, she was confronted with another rival.  By a simple ruse Nydia obtained the poisoned draught and in its place substituted a phial of simple water.

At the close of a banquet given by Diomed, to which the Greek was invited, Julia duly administered that which she imagined to be the secret love potion.  She was disappointed when she found Glaucus coldly replace the cup, and converse with her in the same unmoved tone as before.

“But to-morrow,” thought she, “to-morrow, alas for Glaucus!”

Alas for him, indeed!

When Glaucus arrived at his own house that evening, Nydia was waiting for him.  She had, as usual, been tending the flowers and had lingered awhile to rest herself.