artist such as he! He may turn about her head, or lay her peplum in
folds without reproof or repulse, and to-day when we had to get past bogs
of plaster, and lakes of wet paint, she scarcely picked up the hem of her
dress, and never once allowed me--who would so willingly have supported
her--to lift her over the worst places."

Balbilla reddened and said angrily:

"Really Verus, in good earnest, I will not allow you to speak to me in
that way, so now you know it once for all; I have so little liking for
what is not clean that I find it quite easy to avoid it without
assistance."

"You are too severe," interrupted the Empress with a hideous smile.
"Do not you think Domitia Lucilla, that she ought to allow your husband
to be of service to her?"

"If the Empress thinks it right and fitting," replied the lady raising
her shoulders, and with an expressive movement of her hands. Sabina
quite took her meaning, and suppressing another yawn she said angrily:

"In these days we must be indulgent toward a husband who has chosen
Ovid's amatory poems as his faithful companion. What is the matter
Titianus?"

While Balbilla had been relating her meeting with the sculptor Pollux, a
chamberlain had brought in to the prefect an important letter, admitting
of no delay. The state official had withdrawn to the farther side of the
room with it, had broken the strong seal and had just finished reading
it, when the Empress asked her question.