CHAPTER XVI.

The day had flown swiftly for Dada under the roof of Medius; there were costumes and scenery in wonderful variety for her to look over; the children were bright and friendly, and she had enjoyed playing with them, for all her little tricks and rhymes, which Papias was familiar with by this time, were to them new and delightful.  It amused her, too, to see what the domestic difficulties were of which the singer had described himself as being a victim.

Medius was one of those men who buy everything that strikes them as cheap—­for instance, that very morning, at Kibotus he had stood to watch a fish auction and had bought a whole tub-full of pickled fish for “a mere trifle;” but when, presently, the cargo was delivered, his wife flew into a great rage, which she vented first on the innocent lad who brought the fish, and then on the less innocent purchaser.  They would not get to the bottom of the barrel and eat the last herring, she asserted, till they were a century old.  Medius, while he disputed so monstrous a statement, vehemently declared that such wholesome and nutritious food as those fish was undoubtedly calculated to prolong the lives of the whole family to an exceptionally great age.

This discussion, which was not at all by way of a jest, amused Dada far more than the tablets, cylinders and cones covered with numbers and cabalistic signs, to which Medius tried to direct her attention.  She darted off in the midst of his eager explanations to show his grandchildren how a rabbit sniffs and moves his ears when he is offered a cabbage-leaf.

The report, which reached them in the afternoon, of the proceedings in the square by the Prefect’s house, disturbed Medius greatly, and he set off at once for the scene of action.

He did not return till evening, and then he looked like an altered man.  He must have witnessed something very terrible, for his face was as pale as death, and his usually confident and swaggering manner had given place to a stricken and care-worn air.  He walked up and down the room, groaning as he went; he flung himself on the divan and stared fixedly at the ground; he wandered into the atrium and gazed cautiously out on the street.  Dada’s presence seemed suddenly to be the source of much anxiety to him, and the girl, painfully conscious of this, hastened to tell him that she would prefer to return home at once to her uncle and aunt.

“You can please yourself,” was all he said, with a shrug and a sigh.  “You may stay for aught I care.  It is all the same now!”

So far his wife had left him to himself, for she was used to his violent and eccentric behavior whenever anything had crossed him; but now she peremptorily desired to be informed what had happened to him and he at once acceded.  He had been unwilling to frighten them sooner than was needful, but they must learn it sooner or later:  Cynegius had arrived to overthrow the image of Serapis, and what must ensue they knew only too well.  “To-day,” he cried, “we will live; but by to-morrow—­a thousand to one-by to-morrow there will be an end of all our joys and the earth will swallow up the old home and us with it!”