So it was impossible to determine at present whether Chello had seen the finished statues or not, yet Hermon desired the former with actual fervour, that he might have positive certainty.

While reflecting over these matters, the image of the lean Egyptian goldsmith, with his narrow, brown, smooth-shaven face and skull, prominent cheek bones, receding brow, projecting ears and, with all its keenness, lustreless glance, rose before him as if he could see his bodily presence.  Not a single word unconnected with his trade, the weather, or an accident, had ever reached the friends’ ears from Chello’s thick lips, and this circumstance seemed to warrant Hermon in the expectation of learning from him the pure, unadulterated truth.

Rarely had a messenger of love been awaited with such feverish suspense as the slave whom Gras had despatched to Tanis to induce the goldsmith to return home.  He might come soon after nightfall, and Hermon used the interval to ask the Bithynian the questions which he had long expected.

The replies afforded little additional information.  He learned only that Philippus had been summoned to Alexandria by the King, and that the Lady Thyone and her husband had talked with the leech and assented to his opinion that it would be better for Hermon to wait here until the burns on his face were healed before returning to Alexandria.

For Daphne’s sake this decision had undoubtedly been welcome to the matron, and it pleased him also; for he still felt so ill physically, and so agitated mentally, that he shrank from meeting his numerous acquaintances in the capital.

The goldsmith! the goldsmith!  It depended upon his decision whether he would return to Alexandria at all.

Soon after Hermon had learned from Gras that the stars had risen, he was informed that he must wait patiently for his interview with the Egyptian, as he had been summoned to the capital that very day by a messenger from Proclus.

Then the steward had fresh cause to marvel at his charge, for this news aroused the most vehement excitement.

In fact, it afforded the prospect of a series—­perhaps a long one—­of the most torturing days and nights.  And the dreaded hours actually came—­nay, the anguish of uncertainty had become almost unendurable, when, on the seventh day, the Egyptian at last returned from Alexandria.  They had seemed like weeks to Hermon, had made his face thinner, and mingled the first silver hairs in his black beard.

The calls of the cheerful notary and the daily visits of the leech, an elderly man, who had depressed rather than cheered him by informing him of many cases like his own which all proved incurable, had been his sole diversion.  True, the heads of the Greek residents of Tennis had also sometimes sought him:  the higher government officials, the lessees of the oil monopoly and the royal bank, as well as Gorgias, who, next to Archias the Alexandrian, owned the largest weaving establishments, but the tales of daily incidents with which they entertained Hermon wearied him.  He listened with interest only to the story of Ledscha’s disappearance, yet he perceived, from the very slight impression it made upon him, how little he had really cared for the Biamite girl.