"Which declaration," she responded evenly, "publishes thee a married man; the single gallant declares only for one."
"O deft reasoning! it establishes thee a Roman. What dost thou here, in Alexandria where there is no court, no games, no senators, no Cæsar--naught but riots and Jews?"
"Jews," she said, scanning a rounded arm to see if its rest on the back of the exedra had left a mark on it, "Jews are red-lipped, and eyed like heifers. Sometimes brawn and force weary us in Rome; wherefore we go into Egypt or the East to seek silky and subtle devilishness."
Agrippa moved along the exedra and looked into her eyes. He saw there that peculiar expression which he had expected to find. It was a set questioning, one that runs the scale from appeal to demand--the asking eye, the sign of continual consciousness of the woman-self and her charms.
"Why make the effort? Only tell us of the East that you want us and the East will come to you."
"What? Oriental love-philters, simitars, poisoning, silks and mysticism in the shadow of the Fora and within sound of the Senate-chamber? No, my friend; we must hear the lapping of the Nile or the flow of the Abana, behold camels and priests, and the far level line of the desert, while we languish on bronze bosoms and breathe musks from oriental lips."
"It is not then the Jews," he objected. "They are a temperate, a passionless lot, that carry the Torah like hair-balances in their hearts to discover if any deed they do weighs according to the Law. No, Jews are a straight people. Thou speakest of the--Arab!"
She turned her eyes toward him and measured his length, surveyed his slender hands, and glanced at the warm brown of his complexion.
"And every Jew is thus minded?" she asked, observing later the unmistakable signs of Jewish blood in his profile.
"Unless he is tinctured with the lawlessness of Arabia."
"Ah!" She moved her fan idly and looked up at the sky.
"It is then, of a truth, the Arab, we seek," she added presently. "The Arab that knows no manners but his fathers' manners; who eats, drinks, loves, hates and conquers after his own fashion."
"Without having seen Jerusalem, or Rome?" he asked.
"Rome!" she repeated, looking at him again. "Yes, without having seen Rome or Jerusalem or Alexandria."