They sat down on the couch, and then, all gaiety, she said how she had often heard from Aspasia how busy he had been with his affairs. She had but seldom been of late, however, to see Aspasia. She could not understand how one who had been the friend of Perikles could take up with a man like Lysicles, so burly and so common, whose talk was of his oxen, and his thoughts no better than his talk. And then she told how Sokrates had been to see her. ‘Extraordinary man!’ At first, she said, she wondered what he came for, he asked so many curious questions—how she had gained the love of such a one as Alkibiades, and many other things. And then she mimicked Sokrates, and tried to imitate his eyes and mouth, till her fond lover stopped her. ‘And yet there was much wisdom in it all,’ she said; ‘and when he talked of you and told me how you saved his life at Delion, he grew quite eloquent. I thought I could have listened to him all day long.’ And so she prattled on, as though he had never left her, full of wit and life and loveliness. The night was fresh and bright, and, as he sat gazing at her once more, a feeling of contentment and delight stole over him. Three days he stayed with her, bound by the old chain of love. On the fourth morning she told him he must go, and, after the slight morning meal, she bade him farewell—‘for a time,’ she said, as bright and cheerful as on the day when he came back to her; and he went somewhat reluctantly away. His thoughts were not the bravest as he drew near home. He invented many poor excuses on the way—the busy times, the momentous questions, peace or war—and Kleon had kept him, requiring his counsel. He forgot them all when he knocked at his own door with a forced boldness. The porter opened; he entered with assumed carelessness. All was silent. There was a scared look upon the faces of the slaves—not a sound except the splashing of the fountain as he crossed the courtyard. He passed on to the inner rooms. The ancestral sacred fire burnt upon the altar. No one appeared. He reached his wife’s room. No one was there. He searched the women’s rooms, and at last found old Amykla, whose parents had been slaves of Deinomaché, who had nurtured him in childhood and watched over him through all his boyhood; who would gladly have died for him, and had received his wife with the same love and devotion because she was his wife; who had nursed her when his child was born, and tended both with a mother’s care while he was away at Delion. Amykla came with red eyes and unutterable sorrow in her face. ‘Where is Hippareté? Quick, tell me—where is Hippareté?’ ‘Hippareté is gone, Alkibiades! She would stay no longer here.’ ‘When did she go?’