But one thing I may ask for myself: You have slaves and to spare; if anything happens to Alexander, let me hear of it at once." He kissed Melissa on the head, nodded patronizingly to Andreas, and left the house.
His soft-hearted devotion to a vision had weakened his combativeness; still, he would have yielded less readily to a man who had once been a slave, but that the invitation to Melissa released him of her presence for a while.
He was not, indeed, afraid of his daughter; but she need not know that he wanted Philip to make him acquainted with Serapion, and that through his mediation he hoped at least to see the spirit of the wife he mourned.

When he was fairly out of the house he smiled with satisfaction like a school-boy who had escaped his master..