Chapter XI: Tryphaena. Charmides

_Try._ Well, to be sure! Get a girl to keep company with you, and then turn your back on her! Nothing but tears and groans! The wine was not good enough, I suppose, and you didn't want a _tête-à-tête_ dinner. Oh yes, I saw you were crying at dinner too. And now it is one continued wail like a baby's. What _is_ it all about, Charmides? _Do_ tell me; let me get that much out of my evening with you.

_Ch._ Love is killing me, Tryphaena; I can stand it no longer.

_Try._ It is not love for me, that is clear. You would not be so cold to me, and push me away when I want to put my arms round you. It really is not fair to keep me off like this! Never mind, tell me who it is; perhaps I may help you to her; I know one ought to make oneself useful.

_Ch._ Oh, you two know each other quite well; she is quite a celebrity.

_Try._ Name, name, Charmides!

_Ch._ Well then--Philematium.

_Try._ Which? there are two of them; one in Piraeus, who has only just come there; Damyllus the governor's son is in love with her; is it that one? or the other, the one they call The Trap?

_Ch._ Yes, that is she; she has caught me and got me tight, poor mouse.

_Try._ And the tears were all for her?

_Ch._ Even so.

_Try._ Is this recent? or how long has it been going on?

_Ch._ Oh, it is nothing new. I saw her first at the Dionysia; that makes seven months.

_Try._ Had you a full view of her, or did you just see her face and as much as a woman of forty-five likes to show?

_Ch._ Oh, come! I have her word for it she will be two-and-twenty next birthday.

_Try._ Well, which are you going to trust--her word, or your own eyes? Just take a careful look at her temples some day; that is the only place where her own hair shows; all the rest is a thick wig; but at the temples, when the dye fades a little, you can easily detect the grey. But that is nothing; insist on seeing more than her face.

_Ch._ Oh, but I am not favoured so far as that.

_Try._ No, I should think not. She knows what the effect would be; why, she is all over--oh, talk of leopard-skins! And it was she made you cry like that, was it? I dare say, now, she was very cruel and scornful?

_Ch._ Yes, she was, dear; and such a lot of money as she has from me! Just now she wants a thousand drachmas; well, I am dependent on my father, and he is very close, and I could not very well get it; so she is at home to Moschion, and will not see me. That is why you are here; I thought it might vex her.

_Try._ Well, I'm sure I never never would have come if I had been told what it was for--just to vex somebody else, and that somebody old coffin-ripe Philematium! I shall go away; for that matter the third cock-crow is past.

_Ch._ No, no, not so fast, Tryphaena. If it is all true--the wig, the dye, and the leopard-skin--I shall hate the sight of her.

_Try._ If your mother has ever seen her at the bath, ask her. As to the age, you had better ask your grandfather about that, if he is alive.

_Ch._ Well, as that is what she is like, come up close to me. Give me your arms--and your lips--and let us be friends. Philematium be hanged!

H.