But who could have lavished such a treasure as this gem in exchange for mere rubbish?
It was inconceivable; Ammonius the mechanician was right when he said that a woman full of hatred was capable of anything, even the incredible and impossible.
Meanwhile it was growing dusk and the scorching day had turned to the tempered heat of a glorious evening.

The Mukaukas was still in his room while his wife with Susannah and her daughter, Mary and her governess, were enjoying the air and chatting in the open hall looking out on the garden and the Nile.

The ladies had covered their heads with gauze veils as a protection against the mosquitoes, which were attracted in swarms from the river by the lights, and also against the mists that rose from the shallowing Nile; they were in the act of drinking some cooling fruit-syrup which had just been brought in, when Orion made his appearance.
"What has happened ?" cried his mother in some anxiety, for she concluded from his dishevelled hair and heated cheeks that the meeting had gone anything rather than smoothly.
"Incredible things," he replied.

"Paula fought like a lioness for her father's freedman..." "Simply to annoy us and put us in a difficulty," replied Neforis.
"No, no, Mother," replied Orion with some warmth.

"But she has a will of iron; a woman who never pauses at anything when she wants to carry her point; and at the same time she goes to work with a keen wit that is worthy of the greatest lawyer that I ever heard defend a cause in the high court of the capital.