He gulped and wheezed some time before he could find an answer, and at last, after choking down the tears which had forced their way to his eyes, said, in a half-angry, half-whining tone: "Didn't I say so?
they've bewitched him, they've ruined him in this wicked land.

Whatever a man would do himself, he thinks others are capable of.

Aye, you may look as angry as you like; it matters but little to me.

What can it matter indeed to an old man, who has served the same family faithfully and honestly for sixty years, if they call him at last a rogue, a knave, a traitor, nay even a murderer, if it should take their fancy." And the scalding tears flowed down over the old man's cheeks, sorely against his will.
The easily-moved Phanes clapped him on the shoulder and said, turning to Nebenchari: "Hib is a faithful fellow.

I give you leave to call me a rascal, if he has taken one single obolus from me." The physician did not need Phanes' assurance; he had known his old servant too well and too long not to be able to read his simple, open features, on which his innocence was written as clearly as in the pages of an open book.