It was a glad night when Dom Diego and Ianthe sat again at his table, religiously victualled this time, and with them his beloved brother Joseph, not the least happy of the guests in the reconciliation with Uriel and the near prospect of the treasuryship. What a handsome creature he was! thought Uriel fondly. How dignified in manners, yet how sprightly in converse!--no graven lines of suffering on his brow, no gray in his hair. The old wine gurgled, the old memories glowed. Joseph was let into the secret of the engagement--which was not to be published for some months--but was too sure of the part he had played to suspect he had been played with. He sang the Hebrew grace jubilantly after the meal, and Ianthe's sweet voice chimed in happily. Ere the brothers parted, Uriel had extracted a promise that little Daniel should be lent him for a few days to crown his happiness and brighten the great lonely house for the coming of the bride. XII Uriel Acosta sat at dinner with little Daniel, feasting his eyes on the fresh beauty of the boy, whose prattle had made the last two days delightful. Daniel had been greatly exercised to find that his great big uncle could not talk Dutch, and that he must talk Portuguese--which was still kept up in families--to be understood. He had hitherto imagined that grown-up people knew everything. Pedro, his black face agrin with delight, waited solicitously upon the little fellow. He changed his meat plate now, and helped him lavishly to tart. "Cream?" said Uriel, tendering the jug. "No, no!" cried Daniel, with a look of horror and a violent movement of repulsion. Uriel chuckled. "What! Little boys not like cream! We shall find cats shuddering at milk next." And pouring the contents of the jug lavishly over his own triangle of tart, he went on with his meal. But little Daniel was staring at him with awe struck vision, forgetting to eat. "Uncle," he cried at last, "thou art not a Jew." Uriel laughed uneasily. "Little boys should eat and not talk." "But, Uncle! We may not eat milk after meat." "Well, well, then, little Rabbi!" And Uriel pushed his plate away and pinched the child's ear fondly. But when the child went home he prattled of his uncle's transgressions, and Joseph hurried down, storming at this misleading of his boy, and this breach of promise to the synagogue. Uriel retorted angrily with that native candor of his which made it impossible for him long to play a part. "I am but an ape among apes," he said, using his pet private sophism. "Say rather an ape among lynxes, who will spy thee out," said Joseph, more hotly. "Thy double-dealing will be discovered, and I shall become the laughing-stock of the congregation." It was the beginning of a second quarrel--fiercer, bitterer than the first. Joseph denounced Uriel privily to Dom Diego, who thundered at the heretic in his turn. "I give not my daughter to an ape," he retorted, when Uriel had expounded himself as usual.