“I can read it in your eyes,” said Asclepiodorus, and he gazed kindly after her as, at a sign from him, she quitted the room.

As soon as he was alone he sent for his secretary and said: 

“King Philometor has commanded that his brother Euergetes’ birthday shall be kept to-day in Memphis.  Let all the standards be hoisted, and the garlands of flowers which will presently arrive from Arsinoe be fastened up on the pylons; have the animals brought in for sacrifice, and arrange a procession for the afternoon.  All the dwellers in the temple must be carefully attired.  But there is another thing; Komanus has been here, and has promised us great things in Euergetes’ name, and declares that he intends to punish his brother Philometor for having abducted a girl—­Irene—­attached to our temple.  At the same time he requests me to send Klea the water-bearer, the sister of the girl who was carried off, to Memphis to be examined—­but this may be deferred.  For to-day we will close the temple gates, solemnize the festival among ourselves, and allow no one to enter our precincts for sacrifice and prayer till the fate of the sisters is made certain.  If the kings themselves make their appearance, and want to bring their troops in, we will receive them respectfully as becomes us, but we will not give up Klea, but consign her to the holy of holies, which even Euergetes dare not enter without me; for in giving up the girl we sacrifice our dignity, and with that ourselves.”

The secretary bowed, and then announced that two of the prophets of Osiris-Apis desired to speak with Asclepiodorus.

Klea had met these men in the antechamber as she quitted the high-priest, and had seen in the hand of one of them the key with which she had opened the door of the rock-tomb.  She had started, and her conscience urged her to go at once to the priest-smith, and tell him how ill she had fulfilled her errand.

When she entered his room Krates was sitting at his work with his feet wrapped up, and he was rejoiced to see her, for his anxiety for her and for Irene had disturbed his night’s rest, and towards morning his alarm had been much increased by a frightful dream.

Klea, encouraged by the friendly welcome of the old man, who was usually so surly, confessed that she had neglected to deliver the key to the smith in the city, that she had used it to open the Apis-tombs, and had then forgotten to take it out of the new lock.  At this confession the old man broke out violently, he flung his file, and the iron bolt at which he was working, on to his work-table, exclaiming: 

“And this is the way you executed your commission.  It is the first time I ever trusted a woman, and this is my reward!  All this will bring evil on you and on me, and when it is found out that the sanctuary of Apis has been desecrated through my fault and yours, they will inflict all sorts of penance on me, and with very good reason—­as for you, they will punish you with imprisonment and starvation.”