Page:Frank Stockton - Vizier of the two-horned Alexander.djvu/143

TWO-HORNED ALEXANDER away from him?' 'Yes; he has spoken of you—that is, if you are Zalia, the daughter of an oil-merchant of Rhodes?' "'I am that woman,"' she exclaimed, 'I am that woman! And did he mourn my loss?

"'Not much, I think, not much.' Then I became a little nervous, for if this old woman talked to me much longer I was afraid, in spite of the fact that I was an elderly man when she was a girl, that she would become convinced that I could not be the son of the man who had once been her husband, but must be that man himself. So I hastily excused myself on the plea of business, and after having given her some money I left her."

"And did thee never see her again?" his wife asked, almost with tears in her eyes.

"No, I never saw her again," said Mr. Crowder; "I was careful not to do that: but I did not neglect her; I caused good care to be taken of her until she died."

There was a slight pause here, and then Mrs. Crowder said:

"Thee has known a great deal of poverty; in nearly all thy stories thee is a poor man."