‘No one asked your excellency to apostatise.’
‘Why, what? What did you say just now?’
‘I asked you to promise. It will not be the first time that promises before marriage have not exactly coincided with performance afterwards.’
‘I daren’t—that is, I won’t promise. I believe, now, this is some trap of your Jewish intrigue, just to make me commit myself against those Christians, whom you hate.’
‘I assure you, I despise all mankind far too profoundly to hate them. How disinterested my advice was when I proposed this match to you, you never will know; indeed, it would be boastful in me to tell you. But really you must make a little sacrifice to win this foolish girl. With all the depth and daring of her intellect to help you, you might be a match for Romans, Byzantines, and Goths at once. And as for beauty—why, there is one dimple inside that wrist, just at the setting on of the sweet little hand, worth all the other flesh and blood in Alexandria.’
‘By Jove! you admire her so much, I suspect you must be in love with her yourself. Why don’t you marry her? I’ll make you my prime minister, and then we shall have the use of her wits without the trouble of her fancies. By the twelve Gods! If you marry her and help me, I’ll make you what you like!’
Raphael rose and bowed to the earth.
‘Your serene high-mightiness overwhelms me. But I assure you, that never having as yet cared for any one’s interest but my own, I could not be expected, at my time of life, to devote myself to that of another, even though it were to yours.’
‘Candid!’
‘Exactly so; and moreover, whosoever I may marry, will be practically, as well as theoretically, my private and peculiar property.... You comprehend.’