Then he asked where three boxes of psagdas designed for his own use were
to be found.
The Chief of the Odours confessed that he did not know; some soldiers
had come howling in with knives and he had opened the boxes for them.
"So you are more afraid of them then of me!" cried the Suffet; and his
eyeballs flashed like torches through the smoke upon the tall, pale man
who was beginning to understand. "Abdalonim! you will make him run the
gauntlet before sunset: tear him!"
This loss, which was less than the others, had exasperated him; for in
spite of his efforts to banish them from his thoughts he was continually
coming again across the Barbarians. Their excesses were blended with his
daughter's shame, and he was angry with the whole household for knowing
of the latter and for not speaking of it to him. But something impelled
him to bury himself in his misfortune; and in an inquisitorial fit he
visited the sheds behind the mercantile house to see the supplies of
bitumen, wood, anchors and cordage, honey and wax, the cloth warehouse,
the stores of food, the marble yard and the silphium barn.
He went to the other side of the gardens to make an inspection in their
cottages, of the domestic artisans whose productions were sold. There
were tailors embroidering cloaks, others making nets, others painting
cushions or cutting out sandals, and Egyptian workmen polished papyrus
with a shell, while the weavers' shuttles rattled and the armourers'
anvils rang.
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