“A mere beggar.”
“How well the family jewels would have suited our daughters!”
“Do we want to show Caesar nothing but a few silly pretty faces?—and not something of our wealth and taste?”
“Supposing Hadrian asks who this Roxana is, and had to be told that a collection had to be made to get her a proper costume.”
“Such things never could happen anywhere but in Alexandria.”
“Every one wants to know whether she worked in Plutarch’s factory. They say it is not true—but the painted old villain still loves a pretty face. He smuggled her in, you may be sure; where there is smoke there is fire, and it is beyond a doubt that she gets money from the old man.”
“What for?”
“Ah! you had better enquire of a priest of Aphrodite. It is nothing to laugh at, it is scandalous, audacious!”
Thus and on this wise ran the comments with which the announcement of Arsinoe’s preferment to the part of Roxana was received, and hatred and bitter animosity had grown up in the souls of the dealer and his daughter. Praxilla was selected as a companion to Alexander’s bride, and she yielded without objecting, but on her way homewards she nodded assent when her father said:
“Let things go on now as they may, but a few hours before the performance begins, I will send them word that you are ill.”