e that he really felt no pleasure in the
happy prospect that lay before her, and that she had confessed to him.
And now Heron lent an ear, and gave her to understand the satisfaction of
his fatherly heart by kissing her. This news, in fact, made up for much
that was evil, for Diodoros was a son-in-law after his own heart, and not
merely because he was rich, or because his mother had been so great a
friend of Olympias's. No, the young man's father was, like himself, one
of the old Macedonian stock; he had seen his daughter's lover grow to
manhood, and there was not in the city a youth he could more heartily
welcome. This he freely admitted; he only regretted that when she should
set up house with her husband on the other side of the lake, he (Heron)
would be left as lonely as a statue on its pedestal. His sons had already
begun to avoid him like a leper!

Then, when he heard of what had befallen Diodoros, and Melissa went on to
say that the people who had thrown the stone at the dog were Christians,
and that they had carried the wounded youth into a large, clean dwelling,
where he was being carefully attended when she had left him, Heron broke
out into violent abuse. They were unpatriotic worshipers of a crucified
Jew, who multiplied like vermin, and only wanted to turn the good old
order of things upside down. But this time they should see--the
hypocrites, who pretended to so much humanity, and then set ferocious
dogs on peaceful folk!--they should learn that they could not fall on a
Macedonian citizen without paying for it.

He indignantly refused to hear Melissa's assurance that none of the
Christians had set the dog on her lover; she, however, maintained stoutly
that it was merely by an unfortunate accident that the stone had hit
Diodoros and cut his head so badly. She would not have quitted her lover
but that she feared lest her prolonged absence should have alarmed her
father.

Heron at last stood still for a minute or two, lost in thought, and then
brought out of his chest a casket, from which he took a few engraved
gems. He held them carefully up to the light, and asked his daughter: "If
I learn from Polybius, to whom I am now going, that they have already
caught Alexander, should I venture now, do you think, to offer a couple
of choice gems to Titianus, the prefect, to set him free again? He knows
what is good, and the captain of the watch is his subordinate."

But Melissa besought him to give up the idea of