At this name the old man frowned.
"Ah!" said he, "Mr. Liakos is in your confidence."
Poor Mr. Plateas saw that he had made a mistake in bringing up his friend's name in the affair. He was about to say something,—he did n't know exactly what,—when Mr. Mitrophanis forestalled him, and ended his embarrassment.
"It is well. I will await Mr. Liakos." Then the old gentleman bowed and walked on.
Never in his life had the professor been in such a state of mental distress as that to which he had been a prey ever since the evening before. His sufferings at the time he came so near drowning were not to be compared with his present anguish. Then the danger had come suddenly, and he had realized it to the full only when it was over. Now, the uncertainty of the future added to his misery. At the very moment when he thought he had reached port, he found himself completely at sea again. He stood there in the middle of the square, his arms hanging helplessly, and stared at the back of the retreating merchant.
"Well, I must see Liakos," he said to himself.
"But where shall I find him at this time of day?"
Just then the clock on the Church of the Transfiguration struck twelve. Mr. Plateas remembered, first that his dinner was waiting for him at home, and next that his friend was in the habit of dining at a certain restaurant behind the
