"Have you forgotten Salome, the Jewish actress who could play Aphrodite in the theaters of Ephesus, to the confusion of the goddess herself?
They said she snared three procurators and an emperor at one performance and lost them in a day!" "Have you seen her ?" Julian asked with a sidelong glance.

"Till your own eyes prove it, you should not accept that she is so bewitching." "There is no need that I should see her; Aquila swears it! And I would take his word against the testimony of even mine own eyes." Julian looked up in a startled manner and hurriedly looked away again.
A half-frightened, half-amused smile played about his lips.
"Aquila is no judge of woman," he said finally.

"And furthermore, they say she got to trifling with magic and prowling about the temples to see if the gods came true.

They were afraid she would get them blasted along with her sometime for her sacrilege.

I know all this because Aquila declared she attached herself to him in sheer poverty in Ephesus and swore to follow him to the ends of the earth." The Maccabee smiled.
"Nevertheless, he told me that he was afraid of her, but that she was a woman and in need and he could not reject her." Julian's eyes grew insinuating.
"How much then your behavior this morning would have shocked him!" he murmured.
The smile died on the Maccabee's face.