“You should only see his portraits!” cried Melissa.

“Yours, perhaps, among them?” said the old man, with interest.  “That is a reminder I would gladly take back to Rome with me.”

Alexander had indeed painted his sister not long before, and how glad she was to be able to offer the picture to the reverend man to whom she owed so much!  So she promised with a blush to send it him as soon as she should be at home again.

The unexpected gift was accepted with pleasure, and when he thanked her eagerly and with simple heartiness, she interrupted him with the assurance that in Alexandria art was not yet being borne to the grave.  Her brother’s career, it was true, threatened to come to an untimely end, for he stood in imminent danger.  On this the old man—­who had taken his seat on a bench which the attendant physicians of the temple had brought forward-desired to know the state of the case, and Melissa briefly recounted Alexander’s misdemeanor, and how near he had been, yesterday, to falling into the hands of his pursuers.  Then she looked up at the old man beseechingly; and as he had praised her beauty, so now—­she herself knew not how she had such courage—­the praises of his fame, his greatness and goodness, flowed from her lips.  And her bold entreaties ended with a prayer that he would urge Caesar, who doubtless revered him as a father, to cease from prosecuting her brother.

The old man’s face had grown graver and graver; he had several times stroked his white beard with an uneasy gesture; and when, as she spoke the last words, she ventured to raise her timidly downcast eyes to his, he rose stiffly and said in regretful tones: 

“How can I be vexed with a sister who knocks at any door to save a brother’s life?  But I would have given a great deal that it had not been at mine.  It is hard to refuse when I would so gladly accede, and yet so it must be; for, though Claudius Galenus does his best for Bassianus Antoninus as a patient, as he does for any other, Bassianus the man and the emperor is as far from him as fire from water; and so it must ever be during the short space of time which may yet be granted to him and me under the light of the sun.”

The last words were spoken in a bitter, repellent tone, and yet Melissa felt that it pained the old man to refuse her.  So she earnestly exclaimed: 

“Oh, forgive me!  How could I guess—­” She suddenly paused and added, “Then you really think that Caesar has not long to live?”

She spoke with the most anxious excitement, and her question offended Galenus.  He mistook their purport, and his voice was wrathful as he replied, “Long enough yet to punish an insult!”

Melissa turned pale.  She fancied that she apprehended the meaning of these stern words, and, prompted by an earnest desire not to be misunderstood by this man, she eagerly exclaimed: 

“I do not wish him dead—­no, indeed not; not even for my brother’s sake!  But just now I saw him near, and I thought I could see that he was suffering great pain.  Why, we pity a brute creature when it is in anguish.  He is still so young, and it must be so hard to die!”