Until this day your name was unknown to me, and of good concerning you I have to this hour heard nothing save from your own lips.

May I credit this report you make of yourself?
Or should I rather believe what Marcian, in brief words, declared to me when he heard that you were at his gate ?' The speaker paused, as if to collect courage.
'He spoke ill of me ?' asked Basil.
'He spoke much ill.

He accused you of disloyalty in friendship, saying that he had but newly learnt how you had deceived him.

More than this he had not time to tell.' Basil looked into the old man's rheumy eyes.
'You do well to utter this, good father.

Tell me one thing more.