A smile flitted over Jason’s face, and, raising his voice to a louder tone, he said, flatteringly: 

“Every one can’t have senses as keen as yours, Semestre; have you time to listen to me?”

The house-keeper nodded assent, leaned against the column nearest the hearth, rested both hands on her staff, and bent forward to intimate that she would listen attentively, and did not wish to lose a single word.

Jason stood directly opposite, and, while thus measuring each other with their eyes, Semestre looked like a cautious cat awaiting the attack of the less nimble but stronger shepherd’s dog.

“You know,” Jason began, that when, long ago, we two, you as nurse and I as steward, came to this place, our present masters’ fine estates belonged undivided to their father.  The gods gave the old man three sons.  The oldest, Alciphron, whom you nursed and watched through his boyhood, went to a foreign land, became a great merchant in Messina, and, after his father’s death, received a large inheritance in gold, silver and the city house at the port.  The country estates were divided between Protarch and Lysander.  My master, as the elder of the two, obtained the old house; yours built this new and elegant mansion.  One son, the handsome Phaon, has grown up under our roof, while yours shelters the lovely Xanthe.  My master has gone to Messina, not only to sell our oil and yours, but to speak to the guardian of a wealthy heiress, of whom his brother had written.  He wants her for Phaon’s wife; but I think Phaon was created for Xanthe and Xanthe for him.  There’s nothing lacking, except to have Hymen—­”

“To have Hymen unite them,” interrupted Semestre.  “There’s no hurry about heiresses; they don’t let themselves be plucked like blackberries.  If she has scorned her country suitor, it may well seem desirable to Protarch and all of you that Xanthe should prove more yielding, for then our property would be joined with yours.”

“It would be just the same as during Dionysius’s lifetime.”

“And you alone would reap the profit.”

“No, Semestre, it would be an advantage to both us and you; for, since your master had that unlucky fall from the high wall of the vineyard, the ruler’s eye is lacking here, and many things don’t go as they ought.”

“People see what they want to see,” cried Semestre.  “Our estates are no worse managed than yours.”

“I only meant to say—­”

“That your Phaon seems to you well fitted to supply my master’s place.  I think differently, and, if Lysander continues to improve, he’ll learn to use his limbs again.”

“An invalid needs rest, and, since the deaths of your mistress and mine, quarrelling never ceases—­”

“We never disturb the peace.”

“And quarrelling is even more unpleasant to us than to you; but how often the shepherds and vine-dressers fight over the spring, which belongs to us both, and whose beautiful wall and marble bench are already damaged, and will soon be completely destroyed, because your master says mine ought to bear the expense of the work—­”