The guards led away the old woman, and she drew back into a dark corner, sat down, and covered her face with her hands.

A wondrous sympathy for the hapless woman had taken possession of my soul; I felt as if she belonged to me, and I to her, and I believed in her, even when the turnkey had told me in coarse language that she had lived with a Roman at the old woman's, and had defrauded her of a large sum of money.

The next day I went again to the prison, for her sake and my own; there I found her again in the same corner that she had shrunk into the day before; by her stood her prison fare untouched, a jar of water and a piece of bread.
"As I went up to her, I saw how she broke a small bit off the thin cake for herself, and then called a little Christian boy who had come into the prison with his mother, and gave him the remainder.

The child thanked her prettily, and she drew him to her, and kissed him with passionate tenderness, though he was sickly and ugly.
"'No one who can love children so well is wholly lost,' said I to myself, and I offered to help her as far as lay in my power.
"She looked at me not without distrust, and said that nothing had happened to her, but what she deserved, and she would bear it.

Before I could enquire of her any further, we were interrupted by the Christian prisoners, who crowded around the worthy Ammonius, who was exhorting and comforting them with edifying discourse.