When Caracalla left the balcony, Melissa drew back from the window.

The compassionate impulse to lighten the lot of a sufferer, which had before drawn her so strongly to Caracalla, had now lost its sense and meaning for this healthy, high-spirited man.  She considered herself cheated, as if she had been fooled by sham suffering into giving excessively large alms to an artful beggar.

Besides, she loved her native town, and Caracalla’s advice to the soldiers to force the citizens to provide luxurious living for them, had made her considerably more rebellious.  If he ever put her again in a position to speak her mind freely to him, she would tell him all undisguisedly; but instantly it again rushed into her mind that she must keep guard over her tongue before the easily unchained wrath of this despot, until her father and brothers were in safety once more.

Before the emperor returned, the room was filled with people, of whom she knew none, excepting her old friend the white-haired, learned Samonicus.  She was the aim and center of all eyes, and when even the kindly old man greeted her from a distance, and so contemptuously, that the blood rushed to her face, she begged Adventus to take her into the next room.

The Chamberlain did as she wished, but before he left her he whispered to her:  “Innocence is trusting; but it is not of much avail here.  Take care, child!  They say there are sand-banks in the Nile which, like soft pillows, entice one to rest.  But if you use them they become alive, and a crocodile creeps out, with open jaws.  I am talking already in metaphor, like an Alexandrian, but you will understand me.”

Melissa bowed acknowledgment to him, and the old man went on: 

“He may perhaps forget you; for many things had accumulated during his illness.  If the mass of business, as it comes in, is not settled for twenty four hours, it swells like a mill-stream that has the sluice down.  But when work is begun, it quite carries him away.  He forgets then to eat and drink.  Ambassadors have arrived also from the Empress-mother, from Armenia, and Parthia.  If he does not ask for you in half an hour, it will be suppertime, and I will let you out through that door.”

“Do so at once,” begged Melissa, with raised, petitioning hands; but the old man replied:  “I should then reward you but ill for having warmed my feet for me.  Remember the crocodile under the sand!  Patience, child!  There is Caesar’s zithern.  If you can play, amuse yourself with that.  The door shuts closely and the curtains are thick.  My old ears just now were listening to no purpose.”

But Caracalla was so far from forgetting Melissa that although he had attended to the communication brought to him by the ambassadors, and the various dispatches from the senate, he asked for her even at the door of the tablinum.  He had seen her from the balcony looking out on the square; so she had witnessed the reception his soldiers had given him.  The magnificent spectacle must have impressed her and filled her with joy.  He was anxious to hear all this from her own lips, before he settled down to work.