“And who is this girl yonder?” asked Papias, pointing to Arsinoe, as the two came up.  “Nothing can be said against her beauty, but she is dressed less than simply, and wears no kind of ornament worth speaking of—­it is a thousand to one against her parents being in a position to provide her with such a rich dress, and such costly jewels as Roxana certainly ought to display when about to be married to Alexander.  The Asiatic princess must appear in silk, gold and precious stones.  Now my friend here will be able so to dress his Praxilla that the splendor of her attire might have astonished the great Macedonian himself, but who is the father of that pretty child who is satisfied with the blue ribbon in her hair, her two roses, and her little white frock?”

“Your reflections are just, Papias,” interrupted the dealer, with dry incisiveness.  “The girl you are speaking of is quite out of the question.  I do not say so for my daughter’s sake, but because everything in bad taste is odious to me; it is hardly conceivable how such a young thing could have had the audacity to force herself in here.  A pretty face, to be sure, opens locks and bars.  She is—­do not be too much startled—­she is nothing more than a work-girl in the papyrus factory of our excellent host, Plutarch.”

“That is not the truth,” Pollux interrupted, indignantly, as he heard this assertion.

“Moderate your tongue, young man,” replied the dealer.  “I can call you to witness, noble Plutarch.”

“Let her be whom she may,” answered the old man, with annoyance.  “She is very one of my workwomen, but even if she had come straight here from the gumming-table with such a face and such a figure, she is perfectly in place here and everywhere.  That is my opinion.”

“Bravo! my fine friend!” cried Verus, nodding to the old man.  “Caesar will be far better pleased with such a paragon of charmers as that sweet creature, than with all your old writs of citizenship and heavy purses.”

“That is true,” the prefect said, confirming this statement.  “And I dare swear she is a free maiden, and not a slave.  But you stood up for her friend Pollux—­what do you know about her?”

“That she is the daughter of Keraunus, the palace-steward, and that I have known her from her childhood,” answered the youthful artist emphatically.  “He is a Roman citizen, and of an old Macedonian house as well.”

“Perhaps even of royal descent,” added Titianus, laughing.

“I know the man,” answered the dealer hastily.  “He is an impecunious insolent old fool.”

“I should think,” interrupted Verus with lofty composure, but rather as being bored, than as reproving the irritated speaker, “it seems to me that this is hardly the place to conduct a discussion as to the nature and disposition of the fathers of all those ladies and young girls.”

“But he is poor,” cried the dealer angrily.  “A few days since he offered to sell me his few miserable curiosities, but really I could not—­”