"Man, man!" he cried, grasping Pisander's wrists with all his strength, "speak! Don't look at me this way! Don't say that you mean Artemisia?"
"Ai! You know the girl, then?" said the other, with the most excruciating inquisitiveness.
"Know her?" raged Agias, "I love the sunbeam on which her eyes rest. Speak! Tell me all, everything, all about it I Quick! I must know!"
Pisander drew himself together, and with a deliberation that was nearly maddening to his auditor, began:—
"Well, you see, I had occasion this morning to be in Calatinus's library. Yes, I remember, I was just putting the new copy of Theognis back into the cupboard, when I noticed that the Mimnermus was not neatly rolled, and so I happened to stay in the room, and—"
"By Zeus, speak faster and to the point!" cried Agias.
"Oh, there wasn't very much to it all! Why, how excited you are! Pratinas came into the atrium, and Calatinus was already there. I heard the latter say, 'So I am to give you forty thousand sesterces for the little girl you had with you at the circus yesterday?' And Pratinas replied, 'Yes, if she pleases you. I told you her name was Artemisia, and that I always taught her to believe that she was my niece.'"
"Hei! Hei!" groaned Agias, rushing up and down the room, half frantic. "Don't tell any more, I've heard enough! Fool, fool I have been, to sit in the sunshine, and never think of preparing to carry out my promise to Sesostris. No, you must tell me—you must tell me if you have learned any more. Did Calatinus fix on any time at which he was to take possession of the poor girl?"
"No," replied the still amazed Pisander. "I did not hear the whole conversation. There was something about 'a very few days,' and then Pratinas began to condole with Calatinus over being beaten for the tribunate after having spent so much money for the canvass. But why are you so stirred up? As Plato very admirably observes in his 'Philebus'—"
"The Furies seize upon your 'Philebus'!" thundered Agias. "Keep quiet, if you've nothing good to tell! Oh, Agias, Agias! where are your wits, where is your cunning? What in the world can I do?"