“Yes,” interrupted Myrto, “you are an awful fright. But the mirror? Who took it?”
“Exactly! when they put me on my feet again, my head was suffused with blood, and I was covered with wine up to the ears. Ha! Ha! they all began to laugh . . . Bacchis sent for the mirror . . . Ha! ha! it had disappeared. Somebody had taken it.”
“Who? That is what we want to know.”
“It was not I, that is all I know. It was no use searching me: I was quite naked. I cannot hide a mirror under my eyelid, like a drachma. It was not I, that is all I know. She crucified a slave, perhaps on account of that. When I saw that they were not looking at me, I picked up the Danaë coins. See, Myrto, I have five: you shall buy robes for the three of us.”
The news of the theft spread gradually over the whole square. The courtesans did not hide their envious satisfaction. A noisy curiosity animated the moving groups.
“It is a woman,” said Philotis; “it is a woman who is responsible for this piece of work.”
“Yes, the mirror was well hidden. A thief could have carried off everything in the room and upset everything without finding the stone.”
“Bacchis had enemies, especially her former friends. They knew all her secrets. One of them has probably enticed her away somewhere, and then entered her house at the hour when the sun is hot and the streets are almost deserted.”
“Oh! she has perhaps sold the mirror to pay her debts.”