Berenike had told Barine that the relations between Cleopatra and Archibius dated back to their childhood, but she had learned no particulars.

Various rumours were afloat which, in the course of time, had been richly adorned and interwoven with anecdotes, and Barine naturally lent the most ready credence to those which asserted that the princess, in her earliest youth, had cherished a childish love for the philosopher's son.

Now her friend's conduct led her to believe it.
When Archibius paused, the young beauty assured him that she understood him; and as the alabaster hanging lamp and a three-branched light cast a brilliant glow upon the portrait which her father had painted of the nineteen-year-old Queen, and afterwards copied for his own household, she pointed to it, and, pursuing the current of her own thoughts, asked the question: "Was she not marvellously beautiful at that time ?" "As your father's work represents her," was the reply.

"Leonax painted the portrait of Octavia, on the opposite side, the same year, and perhaps the artist deemed the Roman the fairer woman." He pointed as he spoke to a likeness of Octavianus's sister, whom Barine's father had painted as the young wife of Marcellus, her first husband.
"Oh, no!" said Berenike.

"I still remember perfectly how Leonax returned in those days.