head, as much as to say, indulgently, “Yes, my child, I hear—go on!”

“I am Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt, and I would speak with thee, alone.”

She pauses; then raising one jeweled arm motions to Appolidorus that
he shall withdraw.

With a similar motion, the man at the desk signifies the same to his
astonished secretary.

-------------------------------------

Appolidorus went down the long hallway, down the stone steps and
waited at the outer gate amid the throng of soldiers. They questioned
him, gibed him, railed at him, but they got no word in reply.

He waited—he waited an hour, two—and then came a messenger with a note
written on a slip of parchment. The words ran thus: “Well-beloved
’Dorus: Veni, vidi, vici! Go fetch my maids; also, all of our personal
belongings.”




-------------------------------------

As the cities are all only two days from famine, so
is man’s life constantly but a step from dissolution.