“It’s not painful to have a holiday,” laughed Phormio.
“It’s most painful to be curious yet unsatisfied.”
“But why did not you take the letter to the Babylonian?” observed Phormio, shrewdly.
“I’m perplexed, indeed. Only one thing is possible.”
“And that is—”
“Theon is not known in this street. I am. Perhaps the kyrios didn’t care to have it rumoured he had dealings with that Babylonian.”
“Silence, undutiful scoundrel,” ordered Lampaxo, from her corner; “what has so noble a patriot as Democrates to conceal? Ugh! Be off with you! Phormio, don’t dare to fill up the tipsy fox’s beaker again. I want to pull on my nightcap and go to bed.”
Bias did not take the hint. Phormio was considering whether it was best to join combat with his redoubtable spouse, or save his courage for a more important battle, when a slight noise from the street made all listen.
“Pest light on those bands of young roisterers!” fumed Lampaxo. “They go around all night, beating on doors and vexing honest folk. Why don’t the constables trot them all to jail?”
“This isn’t a drunken band, good wife,” remarked Phormio, rising; “some one is sitting on the stones by the Hermes, near the door, groaning as if in pain.”