have begun more pleasantly than it ended?"

Euergetes nodded assent to the question, and added gravely:

"His fate overtook him--but I cannot see anything very pleasing in the
matter."

"No?" asked the queen. "And do you think that I do not know the asp
that ended that life in its prime? Do you think that I do not know, who
set the poisoned serpent on the Roman? You are the assassin, and Eulaeus
and his accomplices have helped you! Only yesterday I would have given
my heart's blood for Publius, and would rather have carried you to the
grave than him; but to-day, now that I know the game that the wretch has
been playing with me, I would even have taken on myself the bloody deed
which, as it is, stains your hands. Not even a god should treat your
sister with such contempt--should insult her as he has done--and go
unpunished! Another has already met the same fate, as you know--
Eustorgos, Hipparchon of Bithynia, who, while he seemed to be dying of
love for me, was courting Kallistrata my lady in waiting; and the wild
beasts and serpents exercised their dark arts on him too. Eulaeus'
intelligence has fallen on you, who are powerful, like a cold hand on
your heart; in me, the weak woman, it rouses unspeakable delight. I gave
him the best of all a woman has to bestow, and he dared to trample it in
the dust; and had I no right to require of him that he should pour out
the best that he had, which was his life, in the same way as he had dared
to serve mine, which is my love? I have a right to rejoice at his death.
Aye! the heavy lids now close those bright eyes which could be falser
than the stern lips that were so apt to praise truth. The faithless
heart is forever still which could scorn the love of a queen--and for
what? For whom? Oh, ye pitiful gods!"