And she? She had not been unmoved by his devotion, and had been gentler
to this grandson of her father's freed slave than to the best-born man
of her own rank. And in spite of it all Pontius could spoil all the
pleasure of her journey and stay in Alexandria instead of following
in her wake. He could easily have intrusted his building to other
architects--the great metropolis was swarming with them! Well, if he did
not trouble himself about her she certainly need care even less about
him. Perhaps at last, at the end of their travels he might yet come, and
then he should see how much she cared for his admonitions.

But she sighed impatiently for the hour when she might read him all the
verses she had addressed to Antinous, and ask him how he liked them. It
gave her a childish pleasure to add to the number of these little poems,
to finish them elaborately, and display in them all her knowledge and
ability. She gave the preference to artificial and massive metres; some
of the verses were in Latin, others in the Attic, and others again in the
Aeolian dialects of Greek, for she had now learnt to use this, and all to
punish Pontius--to vex Pontius--and at the same time to appear in his
eyes as brilliant as she could. She belauded Antinous, but she wrote for
Pontius, and for every flower she gave the lad she had sent a thought to
the architect, though with a curl on her lips of scornful defiance.

But a young girl cannot be always praising the beauty of a youth in new
and varied forms with complete impunity, and thus there were hours when
Balbilla was inclined to believe that she really loved Antinous. Then
she would call herself his Sappho, and he seemed destined to be her
Phaon. During his long absences with the Emperor she would long to see
him--nay, even with tears; but, as soon as he was by her side again, and
she could look at his inanimate beauty and into his weary eyes, when she