"One thing at any rate we can do for Caesar. I send food every day down to the architect at Lochias, and to-day there shall be three times the quantity."
"Good; do so."
"Farewell, then."
"And we shall meet again, when it shall please the gods and the Emperor."
……………………
When the prefect reached the appointed spot, no vessel with a silver star was to be seen.
The sun went down and no ship with three red lanterns was visible.
The harbor-master, into whose house Titianus went, was told that he expected a great architect from Rome, who was to assist Pontius with his counsel in the works at Lochias, and he thought it quite intelligible that the governor should do a strange artist the honor of coming to meet him; for the whole city was well aware of the incredible haste and the lavish outlay of means that were being given to the restoration of the ancient palace of the Ptolemies as a residence for the Emperor.
While he was waiting, Titianus remembered the young sculptor Pollux, whose acquaintance he had made, and his mother in the pretty little gate-house. Well disposed towards them as he felt, he sent at once to old Doris, desiring her not to retire to rest early that evening, since he, the prefect, would be going late to Lochias.
"Tell her, too, as from yourself and not from me," Titianus instructed the messenger, "that I may very likely look in upon her. She may light up her little room and keep it in order."