Donnotaurus appeared at a loss, but obstinate and about to insist, when the doors opened and there entered a bevy of staff officers, all green and gold and blue and silver, clustered about a huge man in the full regalia of a general, his crimson plumes nodding above his golden helmet, his crimson cloak dangling about his golden cuirass, his gilt kilt-straps gleaming over his crimson tunic-skirt. There was no mistaking that incredible expanse of face, seemingly as big as the body of an ordinary man, those bleary gray eyes under the shaggy eyebrows, their great baggy lower lids, the heavy cheeks and the vast sweep of russet beard.

It was Pescennius Niger himself!

As he was later proclaimed Emperor and narrowly missed overcoming his competitors and emerging master of the world, the mere encounter has a certain interest. Its details, I think, even more.

Up to us he strode.

"What's all this?" he demanded in his big, authoritative voice. Agathemer and I stood up and saluted.

I expected Agathemer, who knew the value of speaking first, to anticipate Donnotaurus, but he let Donnotaurus give his version of the affair.

"I'm competent to decide this," said Pescennius, "and I shall."

And he eyed us, asking: "What have you two to say?"

"In the first place," said Agathemer, "I ask you to examine our papers."

He took from the seat of his chair, where he had placed it as he stood up, our despatch bag, opened it, and displayed its contents; the package of despatches, our credentials, and the diploma entitling us to change of horses, with the endorsement of each change-master from Centumcellae onwards.

Pescennius examined these meditatively.

"These papers," he said, "are in perfect order. But they do not prove that you are the men named in them though they incline me to believe it. I should believe it, but these men deny that you are Bruttius Asper and Sabinus Felix."

"And why do they deny it?" Agathemer queried triumphantly. "Why, because they were caught by this busybody and asked whether they knew Bruttius Asper and Sabinus Felix and they said they did; then haled in here by him and confronted with us and asked whether they knew us and of course said they did not, as they did not. And why do they not know us? Because they are not couriers at all, but men passing themselves off as couriers. Our papers are in perfect order, as you say. Ask them for their papers. They haven't any!"

By the faces of the two I saw that Agathemer had guessed right. They, in fact, were impostors. They had no despatches, no credentials, no papers at all, except a diploma with entries from Bononia, through Parma, Placentia and Clastidium to Dertona and so onwards; a diploma so manifestly a clumsy forgery that, at sight of it, I wondered how it had fooled the stupidest change-master.

Pescennius barely glanced at it. To his apparitors, he said:

"Arrest these three!"

In a trice Donnotaurus and the two impostors were seized.

To us he said:

"Gentlemen, I apologize for having doubted you, even for a moment. And I thank you for having so cleverly and quietly exposed these precious gentry. I shall keep an eye on them and on this local meddler; I'll investigate them in Marseilles.

"Meantime I must eat. So I'll remain here. You are in haste and you have eaten. Your horses are ready. I need not detain you. I'll see you at Marseilles tomorrow. I congratulate you on your horsemanship. To have overtaken me, even when I am travelling by carriage, is no mean exploit. I am pleased to have made your acquaintance."

And he bade us farewell, allowed us to pass out, and seated himself at our table.



CHAPTER XIX

MARSEILLES AND TIBER WHARF

We rode the first mile at full gallop and then slowed to an easy canter which permitted of conversation. All the way to Calcaria we discussed our situation, prospects and plans. We revised our previous view and agreed that we had best not be too late entering Marseilles, as we might not have time to buy cloaks, hats and footgear, change and get rid of our equipment and find lodgings.

Then again, of course, we fell into a panic at the idea of riding into Couriers' Headquarters and perhaps facing a dozen men who knew Sabinus Felix and Bruttius Asper as well as we knew each other. We went over, for the tenth time, a series of absurd suggestions and tried to conceive some way by which we might sneak in at some other gate than that to which our road led, might avoid delivering our despatches and might find ourselves safe in ordinary clothes in some obscure lodging.

But we came to the conclusion that, it would be highly suspicious to act otherwise than as genuine couriers would act. There was nothing for it but to ask our way to Couriers' Headquarters, which would not arouse suspicion, since couriers unacquainted with Marseilles must be constantly arriving there, as green or shifted couriers did at all cities; to ride boldly in; to take what came if we were exposed, to deliver our despatches and stroll out for an airing if we had luck.

Even if we had luck so far I could not forecast our being able to buy ordinary clothing and change into it without causing suspicion, investigation, and our arrest and ruin. Agathemer argued that, if Maternus could find, in Rome, a bath where we could bathe without anyone so much as noticing our brand-marks and scourge-scars, he ought to be able to find in wicked, easy-going Marseilles a shop whose proprietor would ask no question except had we the cash. I was palpitating with panic and could foresee in a shopkeeper only an informer, greedy for a reward for our apprehension.

Agathemer asked:

"Didn't I get us out of our troubles at Tegulata?"

"You certainly did!" I replied. "To a marvel."

"Well," he pursued, "I have full confidence in my intuition and my resourcefulness. I feel that I can get us out of our troubles at Marseilles, if you will let me alone and not interfere."

"I certainly won't interfere," I said, "to spoil any chance you think you see. If you see one, signal me and I'll let you use all your dexterity."

After that we rode evenly to Calcaria and even gaily from there to Marseilles, which we entered about two hours before sunset of a mild, fair, delightful afternoon.

The gate-guard took our questions as a matter of course and directed us to Couriers' Headquarters. There we found only one very stupid Gallic provincial in charge, with a few slaves.

"I," said he, "am Gaius Valerius Procillus."

And he fingered the package of despatches, eyeing us meditatively. I quaked, but kept my countenance.

He eyed us yet longer, but made no comment, wrote out a formal receipt for the despatches, handed it to Agathemer and said:

"Munatius will not be back here at Headquarters till tomorrow. So I cannot tell you whether you will have a day or more of rest, which you have earned, or must set off again at once. Nor can I tell you whether, when you do set off, it will be back to Rome, or onward with some of these same despatches to Spain or Britain or Germany.

"Make the most of your time for rest and refreshment. You are free till tomorrow at sunrise. Dromo will show you your quarters."

And he beckoned one of the slaves.

Headquarters was a low rectangle of two stories only, built of some stone like lime-stone, roofed with red tiles and set about a spacious courtyard. The ground floor seemed mostly stables; but, besides the office in which we had found Procillus, it had other office rooms, a common-room, and we glimpsed a bath and a kitchen. Dromo led us up the stone stair and along the colonnaded portico of the second floor to clean rooms, provided with comfortable cots, chests, stools, and not much else.

We threw our wallets on our cots and sat on stools. As soon as Dromo was gone we opened our wallets, made ourselves comfortable, disposed all our money about us in the body-belts we had bought at Genoa and went out, unopposed and apparently unremarked.

Through the lively streets of Marseilles, in the mellow glow of the evening sunshine, we made for the harborside, Agathemer nosing the air like a dog on the scent. Presently he remarked:

"We are not far from what I am looking for."

And he turned up a side street to our right. As we took turn after turn each street was less savory and more disreputable than the last till we were in a sort of alley populated it seemed by slatternly trulls and trollops.

"This," said Agathemer, "is the quarter of the town I am after, but not quite the part of it I want."

At the end of the alley he questioned a boy, a typical Marseilles street gamin. The lad nodded and led us still to our right, doubling back. After two or three turns Agathemer was for dismissing him. But the lad insisted on convoying us to some definite destination he had in mind.

Agathemer displayed a coin.

"Take that and get out and you are welcome to it," he said. "If you do not agree to get out and to take it, you get nothing."

The boy eyed his face, took the coin, and vanished.

Unescorted we strolled along a clean street, all whitewashed blank lower walls and latticed overhanging balconies; in the walls every door was fast; through the lattices I thought I discerned eyes watching us.

Ahead of us a lattice opened and two faces looked out. In fact two girls leaned out. Their type was manifest: well-housed, well clad, well fed, luxurious, loose-living, light-hearted minxes.

One was plump, full-breasted, merry-faced, with intensely black and glossy hair, a brunette complexion and in her cheeks a great deal of brilliant color, which I afterwards found was all her own, but which at first I took for paint. She wore a gown of a yellow almost as intense as the garb of the priests of Cybele in the Gardens of Verus. Its insistent yellow was intensified and set off by a girdle of black silk cords, braided into a complicated pattern, and by shoulder-knots of black silk, with dangling fringes, and by black silk lacings along her smocked sleeves.

Her companion was tall and slender and melancholy faced, her hair a dull reddish-gold or golden-red, her face without color and a bit freckled, her gown of pale blue.

The black-haired girl called:

"You've had a long ride and you deserve recreation and refreshment. Come in. We don't know you two, but we have entertained couriers before this. This is the place for you."

"Ah, my dear," Agathemer replied, "we not only have had a long ride but we may have to set out on a longer tomorrow, and you know the proverb:

"'Light lovers are seldom long lopers.'"

"If you were too much disinclined to being light lovers," the girl retorted, "you'd never be strolling down this street. Come in!"

"My dear," said Agathemer, "we'd love to come in. But remember the proverb:

"'Gay girls are not good for great gallopers.'"

"Oh, hang your proverbs," the girl laughed down at us. "I don't know what you are up to, but I like you. You don't look as austere as you talk. And I don't mind your asceticism. If you don't appreciate the entertainment offered you, you can have any sort of entertainment you prefer. A goblet of wine and an hour's chat won't enervate you or make you less fit. Come in."

A horrible old Lydian woman, one-eyed, obese, clean enough of body and clothing, but a foul old beast for all that, let us in.

Agathemer introduced me as Felix and himself as Asper. The merry dark- haired girl was named Doris and her languorous comrade Nebris. A more garish and gaudy creature than Doris I have never beheld. I was struck with her profusion of jewels, mostly topazes, but also many carbuncles and garnets; rings, bracelets, a necklace, a hair-comb and many big-headed hair pins. Nebris was equally bejewelled with turquoises and opals, but, somehow, they did not glitter like the jewelry on Doris, but partook of their wearer's subdued coloring. As Doris remarked next day:

"Nebris is very graceful and almost pretty; but she was born faded, and nothing can brighten her."

We found the girls housed in as neat, cosy and charming a little nest as heart could wish for. The atrium was tiny, the courtyard was tiny, everything was tiny. But it all had an air which put us at our ease and made us feel at home. Doris, the dark-haired, red-cheeked, full-contoured lass, was plainly much taken with Agathemer and he with her; I always had a weakness for red-headed girls and felt genuinely pleased that Nebris, her long-limbed, long-fingered, pale-skinned, blurred, bleached comrade seemed equally taken with me. The sofas of the tiny triclinium were soft and comfortable and, after eight days in the saddle, without a bath, we were glad to loll on them. The wine was good and, without any effort, the four of us fell into cheerful chatter about nothing in particular. I complimented Doris on her dwelling and its furnishings and she at once insisted on showing us all over it: the kitchen, bath and latrine beyond the tiny courtyard and upstairs a second triclinium, as tiny as that below, and four tiny bed-rooms, with handsomely carved beds, piled with deep, soft feather beds and feather-pillows. Doris and Nebris each had her bed-room furnished to harmonize with her own coloring. I complimented both on their taste.

In Nebris's room Agathemer spied a flageolet.

"Do you play on this?" he asked.

"Sometimes," she said, "but Doris declares that my music makes her melancholy, it's so dismal."

"I'll play you any number of lively tunes," Agathemer promised, possessing himself of the flageolet.

We all went down into the lower triclinium, where we had left the wine, and Agathemer charmed the girls with his music and, indeed, enlivened me as much as them.

After a score of tunes, while our first goblets of wine were not yet emptied, Agathemer said:

"Felix, I believe I see a way out of our troubles."

"Asper," I replied, "I leave it all to you."

"Doris, my dear," said Agathemer, "we are not Imperial Couriers at all."

Doris stared.

"You mean it?" she asked.

"So help me Hercules," said Agathemer solemnly.

"Well," she meditated, with a sharp intake of her breath. "You fooled me. I thought you were genuine. How did you come in this rig?"

"We belong in Rome, both of us," Agathemer began. "How we came in Placentia is no part of the story. But we were in Placentia and we got into trouble. It wasn't serious trouble; we hadn't killed anybody, or stolen anything, or cheated anybody; but it was trouble enough and aplenty and we decided to get out of Placentia. Roads, road-houses, the towns wouldn't have been healthy for us just then, so we took to the mountains. Not as brigands, you understand, but we hadn't much cash and coin will go farther in the mountains than anywhere else; and the weather was fine and we meant to camp out all we could and stay out all summer and let things blow over. It was hot, burning hot and we blundered on a cave, a nice, big, airy dry cave. We went in to cool off and sleep. And we slept sound."

Then he told our entire story, just as it happened, from our capture by Maternus and his band, all down to Rome, into the Gardens of Verus, out along the Aurelian Highway among the tombs, all about the two drunken robbers, in the moonlight, all about our gallop along the coast, all about our encounter with Pescennius Niger.

Nebris kept looking from Agathemer to me, her pale gray eyes wide; but Doris kept her snapping brown eyes on Agathemer's face from his first word to his last.

"My!" she cried, "you have had adventures! Or you are the biggest liar and the cleverest story-teller I ever met. If you invented that story you deserve help as a paragon among improvisators; if you had all those adventures you deserve help ten times over and you certainly need it. Somehow I believe you. I'll help you all I can. You are in the right place."

And she called:

"Mother, tell Parmenio to find Alopex and bring him to me at once. Tell him to be quick."

One of the slaves went out, slamming the door after him.

"Doris," said Nebris, "can you really save these lads?"

"I can!" Doris asserted.

"With Pescennius Niger after them?" Nebris quavered.

"Even with Pescennius Niger after them," Doris declared.

"You must remember," she went on, "that Pescennius told these lads he would not expect to see them till tomorrow morning. That gives me till dark to set things going and till about two hours after sunrise to finish the job. Unless, indeed, messengers announcing the robbery of the real Sabinus Felix and Bruttius Asper happen to overtake Pescennius at Tegulata or between there and Marseilles. Even then he can hardly get on these lads' trail before dark. I think we shall be able to get these lads away safe, no matter what happens. Anyhow let's be cheerful and make the best of things."

And she filled our goblets.

Alopex could not have been far away. Very shortly we heard the door open and shut and a youth came in, whom Doris introduced as Alopex. A more repulsive being I have never seen. He was of medium height, slender, habited in the embroidered, be-fringed garb fashionable among Marseilles dandies, his hair curled and perfumed, his face much like a weasel's, his complexion like cold porridge. I then had my first glimpse of a Marseilles pimp, and I never want to see another. To me he looked capable of any meanness, of any treachery, of any dishonor, of any crime.

"Alopex," Doris commanded, "look these gentlemen, over and take their measure, then go out and buy hats, cloaks, boots and wallets for them, suitable for a sea-voyage, as inconspicuous as possible, durable and water-proof. Get a porter and bring them back with you, in a bag, so no one on the streets will know what the porter is carrying. Be quick."

"Six gold pieces," said Alopex.

"If you spend six gold pieces on that outfit," said Doris, "you are an ass; you shall have six gold pieces, but bring back a reasonable sum in change, after paying the porter."

I gave Alopex six gold pieces and he went out.

"When he comes back," Agathemer asked, "can he pilot us to a bath, where we shall be as safe as Felix was in Rome in the bath which Maternus knew of?"

"He can and he shall," Doris replied. "You two certainly need a bath: and however you are marked by scourges and brands, the marks won't be noticed at the bath to which he will lead you."

"How about a dinner?" Agathemer queried.

"Asper, my dear," said Doris, "you said you had plenty of cash."

"We have," said Agathemer.

"Then," said she, "just give me one of those gold pieces you got from the two drunken robbers and while you are bathing I'll order as fine a dinner as Marseilles affords and have it here ready to serve when you two get back from your bath."

Alopex soon appeared with a complete outfit for us and the prices which he announced appeared reasonable to me and were agreed to by Doris. He handed Agathemer a gold piece and three silver pieces.

"Change," Doris commanded, and we took off our boots and put on those Alopex had brought us. Doris had Parmenio bundle up our couriers' attire, boots and hats and said:

"I hate to see anything wasted. These outfits are going to be found at Couriers' Headquarters and no one will ever suspect how they got there. You can arrange that, Alopex, can't you?"

"Easy as that," said Alopex, snapping his fingers.

"Then you do it," she ordered, "and now take these gentlemen to Sosia's bathhouse and give him the tip that they are all right."

Alopex acceded sulkily but obediently. That bath refreshed me amazingly and Agathemer seemed to enjoy it as much as I did. It was after sunset when we were back with Doris and Nebris, but still far from dark; in fact, light enough to see well.

"Now Alopex," said Doris, briskly, "make your best speed to the harborside and see if you can find a sure ship sailing at dawn, with a captain we can trust, to get these lads out of Marseilles at once. I doubt if you can find one, but do your best."

"We want a ship for Antioch," Agathemer put in.

"Alopex," said Doris, "find a ship to get these lads out of Marseilles at dawn, never mind where it is bound for. Now go. And come back and report, tonight, sure, and as soon as you can."

When he was gone she rounded on Agathemer:

"Asper," said she, "I am ashamed of you. You are a fool. With Pescennius Niger likely after you, foaming at the mouth, raging because he let you slip through his fingers, you talk of picking and choosing a destination? Why lad, it makes no difference where the ship is bound so it is seaworthy, has a captain I can trust and is headed away from Marseilles. The point for you two is to get away from Marseilles quick. Whether you land at Carthage, or even Cadiz, makes no difference. You can reship from anywhere to anywhere, once you are clear of Marseilles. You might linger in Marseilles, under my protection, but for your encounter with Pescennius Niger. But after that there is nothing for you to do but get away quick."

She paused for breath, shaking her finger at us, like a nurse at naughty children.

"And now," said she, "let's get at that dinner. I'm hungry and I'm sure you ought to be."

We were. And the dinner was excellent, much of it unfamiliar. The Marseilles oysters had a flavor novel, odd, not agreeable at first, but very likable after a bit of experience with it. Everything out of the sea was tasty. The main dish was a wonderful stew of fish, for which, Nebris told us, Marseilles was famous. It was flavored with any number of vegetables and relishes, and had bits of meat in it, but fish was the chief ingredient and the blended flavors made it a most appetizing viand.

We ate slowly, had just finished our fruit and Agathemer was playing the flageolet to the accompaniment of enthusiastic applause from both girls when Alopex returned. He reported that no ship could possibly be gotten for us the next morning and vowed that it would likely take him all day to find one for the morning after.

"Then run off, like a good boy," said Doris, "and get a good long sleep so as to be fresh tomorrow. Start before daylight and report to me before noon. Run along."

"How about lodging for us?" Agathemer queried.

Doris half chuckled, half snorted.

"Run along, Alopex," she commanded.

When he was gone she faced Agathemer, arms akimbo.

"Asper," she said, "I'm going to save you two lads, no matter how idiotically you act or talk. I like you, in spite of your ridiculous ascetic airs and your nonsensical assumption of austerity. You can't make me angry nor lose my protection, no matter how rude and chilly you are. If you two don't appreciate the kind of entertainment we are offering you and haven't sense enough and manners enough to accept it and be thankful, you can sleep here anyhow, where and how you prefer. But you don't go out of this house tonight, nor yet tomorrow, not if I know it. I'm going to save you two, in spite of your folly."

Naturally, after that, we stayed where we were.

Next morning, not much more than an hour after sunrise, as we were again enjoying flageolet music from Agathemer, Alopex returned and reported that he had found a clean, roomy, seaworthy ship, captained by a man well and favorably known to him and Doris, which would sail for Rome at dawn next day.

"That's your ship," said Doris to us.

"After what I told you," Agathemer protested, "do you seriously advise us to set sail for Rome?"

"I do," Doris declared. "Any place on earth is healthier for you two than Marseilles. Were you in trouble in Rome before you got into trouble in Placentia?"

"We were," said Agathemer, "and trouble of the deepest dye."

"Asper, my dear," said Doris, "no matter what sort of trouble you were in at Rome, Rome can't be as dangerous for you as Marseilles. And by all I hear, Tiber Wharf is a fine locality in which to hide and Ostia nearly as good. Take my advice and sail. From Rome or Ostia you ought to find it easy to ship for Antioch."

"I believe you," said Agathemer, "but I'd like to have more cash with me than I have and I'd like to give you two girls enough gold pieces to serve as a sort of indication of our gratitude. No gold either Felix or I shall ever possess would be enough to repay you for what you have done for us.

"Now I have an emerald of fair size and of the best water and flawless at that, sewn into the hem of my tunic. Since you are so capable at finding safe shops and baths and ships, perhaps Alopex could guide me to a gem- expert who would like to buy a fine emerald and who would pay a fair price for it and keep his mouth shut."

"I had not meant you so much as to poke your nose out of doors till tomorrow before sunrise," said Doris, meditatively, "but Pescennius won't be suspicious yet unless a post with news of the robbery you profited by has already reached here. I fancy it will be a safe risk for Alopex to escort you to our gem-expert. He'll pay you an honest three-quarters of the full value of your emerald. Alopex and I get a rake-off on his profits, as we do on the fare of the men we ship out of Marseilles. Gems and fugitives are part of my regular line of trade, with efficient help from Alopex."

Actually Agathemer was gone about two hours and came back with a portly bag of gold pieces. He found us in the triclinium, Nebris lying on the sofa with me, and playing a dismal tune on her flageolet, Doris on the other sofa laughing at us. He lay down by Doris, spilled the gold on the inlaid dining table, divided it into four equal portions, pouched one, made me pouch another, and piled one in Doris's lap, while I similarly piled the other in Nebris's lap.

"Share and share alike," said Agathemer, "and you are welcome to whatever part of his rake-off Alopex turns over to you."

"Asper," said Doris, "you are a dear. Play us a decent tune. Nebris's music makes me doleful."

We spent the day eating, drinking, chatting, napping and listening to Agathemer's very lively music.

For dinner we had another Marseilles fish-stew, entirely different from the former, and entirely different from anything I had ever eaten elsewhere.

Next morning Doris had us all up, bathed as well as we could in her tiny bath, fed and ready to set out long before the first streak of dawn appeared in the east. Agathemer, on his gem-selling expedition, had bought all we needed to line our wallets except food, and that Doris supplied in abundance and variety and of a sort calculated to be palatable two or three days out at sea.

Doris was a creature no man could forget. She was buxom and buoyant and completely content with her home, her way of life, her friends and her prospects; and as capable and competent a human being as I ever met. When Alopex gave his cautious tap on the door and slipped inside she bade us farewell unaffectedly, kissed me like a mother, and gave Agathemer one sisterly hug and one smacking kiss. If there were tears in her eyes none ran down either cheek.

Nebris, on the other hand, wept over me and clung to me, with many kisses.

"There are not many like you," she sobbed. "You are gentle and courteous. Our friends are generous enough, but they drink too much and are boisterous and rough and coarse. I wish you weren't going. But I'm glad I've had you even for so short a time."

And she gave Agathemer her flageolet, holding it out to him with her left hand, her right arm round my neck.

"Come, come!" Doris bustled, "act sensible, child!"

We tore ourselves away and followed our unsavory guide through the dim, foggy streets. I distrusted Alopex and should not have been astonished had he turned us over to a batch of guards, waiting for us at any corner. But he led us to a fine stone quay by which was moored as trig a merchantman as I ever saw, new and fresh painted. Her captain was a bluff, hearty, wind-tanned Maltese, Maganno by name, swarthy, hook-nosed and with a shock of black curls. He counted the gold pieces Alopex gave him and said, in Latin with a strong Punic accent:

"My ship is yours from here to Tiber wharf."

We shook hands on it, went on board and she cast off at once and was out of the harbor before the sun had dispersed the fog. To our surprise we set a course not about southeast as we had expected, but along the coast until we passed Ulbia, and then almost due east. Maganno explained:

"Give me the open sea. You Italians are always for hugging the shore: we Maltese, like our Phoenician ancestors, are all for clear water. I've sailed between Corsica and Sardinia, and once was enough for me. I've made this cruise many times and I always prefer to weather the Holy Cape."

North of Corsica, in fact, we sped, with a fair following wind and we had an unsurpassably fortunate voyage; skies clear, wind always favorable, steady and neither too gentle nor too strong. Our time we spent on deck from before sunrise till long after sunset, dozing through the heat of the day; Agathemer, when awake, playing on his flageolet, more often than he was silent, to the delight of all on board. The crew were mostly Maltese, like their master, using indifferently their own dialect, Greek of a sort and very poor Latin. Maganno's Latin was better than theirs, but all racy with his accent.

When we were already in sight of the month of the Tiber he sat down by us and said:

"I was told that you lads were in trouble. But, certainly, you are lucky voyagers. I have sailed from Ostia to Marseilles and from Marseilles to Ostia forty-one times, and this forty-second is the easiest and quickest passage ever I made. I like you lads. Anybody Doris recommends I always help, for her sake. I'll also help you for your own. Tell me your plans and I'll do my best for you."

He agreed with us that both the Northern Harbor and Ostia were certain to be swarming with spies and secret-service agents and informers: so, for that matter, was the harbor-side of Rome along the Tiber: but Rome, being many times as large as Ostia, was likely to be proportionately easier to hide in.

"That's where a small merchantman like mine," said he, "beats any big one. That's why I sail always a small ship, never a big ship. A big merchantman must berth at Ostia or at the Northern Harbor. My ship can sail on up the Tiber to Rome. And I shall. You come on up with me."

His advice seemed good. We decided to stay on the ship all the way up to Rome, and we did, lolling on deck to Agathemer's piping in the mellow sunshine.

So idling we spoke more than once of the Aemilian Sibyl and of this second fulfillment of her acrid prophecy.

Maganno promised to find us a ship loading for Antioch; seaworthy, roomy and with a trustworthy captain.

This could not be done quickly and, he found us, meantime, lodgings with a friend of his, a fat, bald, one-eyed cook-shopkeeper named Colgius, who rented us a tiny room over his eating-room, which was not far from the Ostian Gate, between the public warehouses and the slope of the Aventine.

At his table we fared pretty well, for his prices were low, his wine drinkable, and most of his food eatable, though we did not try a second time the viands for which he had the briskest demand: a very greasy pork stew of which he was inordinately proud, amazingly rank ham, and incredibly strong Campanian cheese; all three of which seemed to delight his customers, who were an astonishing medley of slaves and freemen: porters, stevedores, inspectors' assistants, coopers, mariners, jar- markers, gig-drivers, teamsters, drivers of all sorts of hired vehicles, drovers who herded cattle from Ostia to the cattle-market, vendors of sulphur-dipped kindling-splints, collectors of street filth and others equally low in class, equally novel to me.

Colgius took a fancy to us and undertook to show us Rome. It struck me oddly that, whereas Nona, in every fiber an Umbrian Gaul, and Maternus, who had spent all his life beyond the Alps, had both, at first glance, recognized us for what we were, Roman master and Greek servant, this Roman of the Romans, keen for personal profit, habituated to the sight of men from all ports, accepted us for Gallic provincials, and never suspected that we were anything else.



CHAPTER XX

CHARIOTEERING

Sight-seeing in Rome, in the guise of Gallic wastrels, under the tutelage of a harborside slum host, was truly an experience for me after my former station as a nobleman of the Republic, and my ruin and disguise and flight. I positively enjoyed it.

First of all Colgius was for showing us over the stables of the Reds, for he was mad about racing and boasted that he had bet on the Reds since he was six years old and his father gave him his first copper. But I demurred and pointed out that none of the racing-stables were fit places for us, since a steady stream of Spanish horses trickled through Marseilles and on through Vada Sabatia and Genoa to Rome, and there was too great a probability that we might come face to face with some groom, hostler or hanger-on from Marseilles who would know us at sight. Colgius yielded to this argument and agreed that we must avoid all the racing stables. This greatly relieved us, since, while neither I nor Agathemer had been devotees of the sport, both of us had been through all six establishments often enough to be likely to be recognized in any one of them.

Baffled in his first choice and, apparently, in his only choice, Colgius asked us what we wanted to see. I said I wanted most to see a day of racing in the circus, blurting out this rather foolish utterance without reflection, merely because I thought it would seem natural to him. He replied that that would be easy, but that the next racing day was day after tomorrow: what would we like to do today?

I said I wanted first of all to be shown the Temple of Mercury, for I wanted to make an offering to the god.

"Oh, yes," he said, "Mercury is your chief god in Gaul, isn't he, and you put him ahead of Jupiter. What is it you call him?"

"You are thinking of the Belgians," I said, "and of the Gauls in the Valley of the Liger. They call Mercury Tiv or Tir and regard him as their chief god. But we provincials never had any such ideas: we worship the same gods as you, in the same way. But I, personally, while revering Jupiter as king of the gods, have always particularly sought the favor of Mercury."

Off we went to the meat market and I bought there two white hens, as on the day of my flight, more than a year before. With one under each arm I then followed Colgius to the Temple of Mercury and there made my prayers and offering.

When we came out he, of course, began to display the outside of the Great Circus and to tell me of its glories, which, he said, he would show me from the inside the day after tomorrow. The life there was much as Maternus and I had seen it twenty-three days before.

We could not avoid following Colgius about Rome, round the Palatine, the Colosseum and the Baths of Titus and through the Forums of Vespasian, Nerva, Augustus and Trajan. At Trajan's Temple he reiterated his regrets that we dare not go on to the stables of the Reds, and turned back through Trajan's Forum, the Forum of the Divine Julius and the Great Forum. Of course, I was quaking with dread for fear some lifelong acquaintance would recognize me, even in my coarse attire. But none did: in fact I set eyes on no one I knew, except Faltonius Bambilio, who was pompously lecturing ten victims in the Ulpian Basilica. I was certain that his eyes were only on his auditors; the sight of him did not alarm me, he never paid any attention to those he considered his inferiors.

All along Agathemer and I were bursting with suppressed giggles: Colgius paid very little attention to the Palace, the Great Amphitheater, the magnificent public baths, the temples or to any of the glories about us; he was all for cook-shops and hauled us into cook-shops without number, sometimes presenting his Gallic friends, Asper and Felix, to his good friend, the proprietor, sometimes bursting into invectives against the bad cookery, infinitesimal portions or absurd prices of his enemies' establishments. In cook-shops Agathemer and I felt safe, near a cook-shop we felt almost safe, between cook-shops, companioned by Colgius and any cook-shop frequenters we met, we felt more than a little safe. To our thinking no spy, informer or secret service agent would feel suspicious towards Colgius and his friends, nor towards us in their company, and he presented us to idlers, loafers, louts, betting agents, sellers of tips on the races, friends of jockeys, cousins of hostlers and such like to an amazing number.

We found all Rome, as we saw it in the company of Colgius, humming with two names and we made sure that, if they buzzed in such company as we were in they also formed the chief topics of conversation in all parts of the city and at every level of society from the senators down.

One name we had heard when in Rome with Maternus, but had barely heard it; now we heard it everywhere; the name of Palus, the charioteer; Palus, the incomparable jockey; Palus, the king of horsemasters; Palus the chum of Commodus. Both of him, and about him, not only from the men who talked to us, but also from bystanders, diners and idlers, who never noticed us or knew that we overheard them, we heard the most amazing stories:

He could guide six horses galloping abreast between the test-pillars for tyros driving four-abreast and never jostle a pillar or throw a horse; he had done it time after time; he had won three races, driving seven horses abreast, his competitors driving four abreast; he had won a race, with a team of four Cappodocian stallions, guiding them without reins, by his voice only; he was the most graceful charioteer, bar no one, ever seen in Rome.

As to his origin and personality the stories were not only fantastic, but divergent, contradictory or incompatible.

If we might believe what we heard he had been presented to Commodus by the same nobleman who had presented Murmex Lucro, and on the very next day; he was from Apulia; he was a Roman all his days; he was a Sabine; he was a nobleman in disguise, he had been a foundling brought up in the Subura; he was a half brother of Commodus, offspring of an amour between Faustina and a gladiator, reared in Samnium on a farm, lately recognized and accepted by the Emperor; he was Commodus himself in disguise.

All this, you may be sure, made us prick up our ears. Still more did we at the sound of the other much-bandied name. Here again the tales were varied, inconsistent, antagonistic.

But the name!

That name was:

Marcia!

Marcia was in control of Commodus, of the Emperor, of the Republic, of the Empire. She was domiciled in the Palace, she was treated as Empress, she had all the honors ever accorded an Empress except that she never participated in public sacrifices or other ceremonial rituals. Crispina had been divorced and was no longer Empress, but had been relegated, under guard, to a distant island; Crispina was still Empress, but had withdrawn in disdain from the Palatine, occupied the Vectilian Palace on the Caelian Hill, still received Commodus when he visited her, but would not set foot on the Palatine nor take part in any ritual or ceremonial; Crispina had been murdered by Marcia's orders, in her presence, with the Emperor's consent; Marcia got on well with the Empress, there was no jealousy between them, Crispina was glad to have someone who could soothe Commodus in his periodic rages and humor him when he sulked; every possible variety of story about Crispina was told, but every tale represented Marcia as undisputed and indisputable mistress of the Palace and of everybody in it.

Of her origin we heard mostly versions of the true story; often we heard named Hyacinthus and Ummidius Quadratus, never my uncle nor Marcus Martius. We dared not seem to know anything about Marcia and so could not name Marcus Martius or ask after him. From all the talk we heard, addressed to us or about us, his name was as absent as if he had never existed.

How Marcia came to the Emperor's attention, won his notice, acquired her mastery of him, as to all this we heard not one word: of her complete control of him and of all Rome everyone talked openly.

The next day we escaped the unwelcome attention of Colgius because Maganno came after us to introduce us to the captain who was to take us to Antioch, to show us his ship, and to make sure we knew the wharf at which she lay and how to reach her. The ship was to sail two days later. The captain's name was Orontides, which struck both me and Agathemer as being the same as that of the most fashionable jeweler in Rome, whose grandfather had come from Antioch, where, I suppose, the name would be as natural and frequent as Tiberius with us.

He was a Syrian Greek, with curly brown hair and brown eyes, by no means so wind-tanned and weather-beaten as Maganno, but manifestly a seaman. He was bow-legged and had very large flat feet.

Orontides looked us over, approved us, required a deposit of twenty gold pieces, counted them, said we might pay the rest of his charges at Antioch, and we shook hands on the bargain.

Yet, as the cost of the voyage would land us in Syria with but a few coins, it was well for us that, later in the day, Agathemer found a dealer in gems lately come to Rome and sold him another jewel. This filled our pouches and left us certain of having gold to spare until he could manage to find a purchaser for yet another gem in Antioch or elsewhere.

Colgius, when we returned to our lodgings, talked of nothing but the Games which were to be celebrated next day. He first exhibited the togas which he had hired for us to wear; we, as fugitives, having, of course, no togas of our own. We found them clean and tried them on. Colgius approved and went on with his enthusiasm.

There were to be twenty-four faces, all of four-horse chariots only, twelve in the morning, of six chariots, one for each of the racing companies; twelve in the afternoon, of twelve chariots, two for each of the racing companies. Colgius discoursed at length as to his opinions concerning the six companies, inveighing against the Golds and the Crimsons, declaring that they were rich men's companies, in which only senators and nobles took any interest and the existence of which spoiled racing.

"You never heard of a plain man like me betting on the Crimson or the Gold," he ranted, "all folks of moderate means, all the plain people, all the populace, bet on the Reds, Whites, Greens or Blues. I agree that the Greens are the most popular company, most popular with all classes from the senators and nobles to the poorest, but I will never admit, as many claim, that the Blues have the second place in the affections of the people; the Blues, I maintain, come third and the Reds have second place with all classes. The Whites are a strong fourth. But, as to the Golds and the Crimsons, no one ever lays a wager on them except the enormously rich nobles and senators whose ancestors organized them under Domitian a hundred years ago. But they, being so enormously rich, can buy the best horses and have the best jockeys. Now they have Palus. The Reds have Scopas and the Greens Diocles, and both have been wonderful, but Palus can beat anybody.

"They say he has wagered an enormous sum that he will win all of the twelve races in which he is to run, the first six odd numbers and the last six even numbers, and that he will do so in a previously specified way; that he will take and keep first place in the first race; that, in the others he will, at the start, take second place, third place and so on progressively further back in each, till he lets the whole of five get ahead of him in the eleventh race and the whole field of eleven have the start of him in the last race."

Colgius was afraid Palus would succeed in doing precisely what he purposed. The Reds, if they won any races, must win in those in which Palus did not start. He judged they could not hope to win more than eight of those twelve. He was gloomy.

Next day dawned fair, mild, and with a gentle breeze, perfect weather for spending a day in the Circus. To this Agathemer and I looked forward with some trepidation, for service men, spies and informers were always in all parts of the Circus and one might recognize me. But we comforted ourselves with the hope that they were no longer on the lookout for me. If I knew the ways of secret-service men I conjectured that they would never have been willing to report the truth: that they could find no trace of me, that I had vanished utterly and completely. I would have been willing to wager that, within a month of my disappearance, some corpse somewhere was identified as mine and my suicide reported as verified; which report had probably been accepted at the Palace; whereafter I would be off the minds of all secret-service men everywhere. Therefore I felt reasonably sure that no agent would be on the lookout for me. Of course there was a chance that one might recognize me by accident. But this was so unlikely that we did not worry over it much.

I was more concerned for fear of arousing suspicion in Colgius by not behaving as he would expect a Gallic Provincial to behave at his first sight of the great games in the Circus Maximus. I could not be sure at what he would expect me to exclaim, what I ought to wonder at and remark on to seem natural in my assumed role of Marseilles scapegrace.

We were a party of eight, Colgius, his wife Posilla, and two teamsters or drovers named Ramnius and Uttius, who conveyed goods or convoyed cattle between Ostia and the markets of Rome. They had their wives with them, but I forget their names. The three women were arrayed in wonderful costumes of cheap fabrics dyed in gaudy hues and adorned with jewelry of gilt or silvered bronze set with bits of colored glass. I had seen such at a distance, but never so close.

Both Agathemer and I liked Ramnius and Uttius; we felt at ease with them at first sight. And they were evidently intimates of Colgius and high in his favor. He and they wore their togas with all the awkwardness to be expected from men who donned togas only for Circus games and Amphitheatre shows. To my amazement I found myself really delighted at again wearing a toga. Like all gentlemen I had always loathed the hot, heavy things. But I found myself positively thrill at being again garbed as befits a Roman on a holiday or at a ceremonial. Besides I found that a toga, over a poor man's tunic, was not nearly so uncomfortable as it was over the more complicated garb of a fashionable person of means and position.

The interior of the Circus, from my novel location, appeared sufficiently strange to lull my dread that I might seem too familiar with it. Of course we were very far back, only five rows in front of the arcade, whereas as long as I was a nobleman of Rome in good standing, I had always sat in the second tier, far forward.

But what made much more difference than sitting far back and high up instead of well forward and low down was that we were on the other side of the Circus from my old seat and almost directly opposite it. I had always sat in section E, about the middle of the east side of the Circus and not far from the Imperial Pavilion in section C. We were in section P, directly facing E, and not far from the judges' stand in section O.

Now from where I had been used to sitting, facing a little south of west, I had viewed only the tiers of seats and of spectators, the upper arcade, and, above that the roofs of the not very lofty, large or magnificent temples on the Aventine Hill. From where we sat with Colgius we faced the Palatine and I was overwhelmed by the vastness, beauty and grandeur of the great mass of buildings which make up the Imperial Palace. On a festival day, of course, they were exceptionally gorgeous, for every window was garlanded at the top and most displayed tapestries or rugs hung over the sill, every balcony was decorated similarly and with greater care than the windows, and every window, balcony and portico was a mass of eager faces. Especially my eye was caught by the crowd of Palace officials and servants on the bulging loggia built by Hadrian in order to be able to catch glimpses of games when he was too busy to occupy the Imperial Pavilion in the Circus itself. That Pavilion, as yet occupied only by a few guards, I gazed at with mixed feelings.

Colgius put Agathemer next him, then me; beyond me sat Ramnius and his wife and then Uttius and his. But across Posilla we were introduced to two cattle inspectors named Clitellus and Summanus of whom we felt uncomfortably suspicious from the instant we laid eyes on them. They looked to me like secret-service agents and Agathemer nodded towards them, when they were not looking, raised his eyebrows and touched his lips.

I for some time satiated myself with gazing at the Palace, with admiring the wonderful charm of the outlook from this side of the Circus, with revelling in the sense of delight at being again in it, with feasting my eyes on its gorgeousness, on the magnificence of its vastness, of its colonnade, of its costly marbles, of its tiers of seats, of the obelisks, shrines, monuments and other decorations of the spina.

Then, after the upper seats were well packed with commonality, the gentry and nobility began to dribble into the lower tiers and even a few senatorial parties entered their boxes in the front row. I began to peer at party after party, outwardly trying to keep my face blank, inwardly excited at the probability of recognizing many former friends and acquaintances.

The first man I recognized was Faltonius Bambilio, unmistakably pompous and self-satisfied. Although a senator he came early. Later I saw Vedius Vedianus and, far from him, Satronius Satro. Didius Julianus, always the most ostentatious of the senators, was unmistakable even in section B, further from me than any part of the Circus except the left hand starting stalls and their neighborhood.

I looked for Tanno in section D, and early made him out.

But, even after the equestrian seats and senatorial boxes had all filled, nowhere could I descry any feminine shape at all suggestive of Vedia. I was still peering and sweeping the senatorial seats with my eyes, hoping to espy her, when the bugles announced the Emperor's approach and the audience stood up. My eyes were on the Imperial Dais watching for the appearance of the Emperor. But when he came into sight, and I joined in the cheers, I viewed without emotion this man, who had honored me with his favor, yet who had credited to the utmost, without investigation, my inclusion among the number of his dangerous enemies. I reflected that no man accused of participating in a conspiracy against any Prince of the Republic had ever been given any sort of hearing or his friends allowed to try to clear him.

I used all my powers of eyesight to con the Emperor, distinctive in his official robes but too far off to be seen well. He appeared to me to have lost something of his elegance of carriage and grace of movement. He seemed less elastic in bearing, less springy of gait. There was, even at that distance, something familiar in his attitude and stride, but it did not seem precisely the presence of Commodus as I had known him. I stared puzzled and groping in my mind. But I felt no emotion as I stared and peered at him.

Oddly enough, from the moment when I received Vedia's letter of warning until I caught sight of the head of the procession about to enter the Circus through the Procession gate, I had had not one instant of despondency or of self-pity. But, at sight of the head of that magnificent procession, a sort of wave of misery surged through me and inundated me with a sudden sense of wistful regret for all that I had lost and also with an acute realization of the precarious hold I had on life, of the peril I was in from hour to hour. This unexpected and unwelcome dejection possessed me until the whole line of floats displaying the images of the gods had passed and the racing chariots came along.

The very first of these drawn by a splendid team of four dapple grays, was driven by a charioteer wearing the colors of the Crimsons' Company. I did not need to hear the exclamation of Colgius:

"There is Palus! That is Palus!" to recognize this Prince of Charioteers. The descriptions I had heard were enough to have told me who he was. For at even a distant sight of him I did not wonder at the tales which gave out that he was a half brother of Commodus, or Commodus in disguise. He was more like Commodus than any half brother would have been likely to have been; like as a twin brother, like enough to be actually Commodus himself. He had all Commodus' comeliness of port and refinement of poise. Every attitude, every movement, was a joy to behold. I stared back and forth from this paragon in a charioteer's tunic to the stolid lump on the Imperial throne, perplexed at the enigma, feeling just on the verge of comprehension, but baffled. I kept gazing from one to the other till Palus rounded the further goal and was largely hidden by the posts, the stand for the bronze tally-eggs, the obelisk and the other ornaments of the spina. [Footnote: See Note G.]

There were about two hundred chariots, for very few teams were entered to race twice. More than a third were driven by charioteers, the rest by grooms, or others, quite competent to control them at a walk, though some of the more fiery had also men on foot holding their bits.

"Felix," Agathemer queried, "did you notice anything peculiar about the first chariot?"

"Yes, Asper," I replied, "I did. I never saw a chariot with its wheels so close together, nor with such long spokes. Its axle is higher from the ground than any I ever set eyes on."

"I recall," said Agathemer, "hearing you recount a lecture on chariot- design you once heard from a man of lofty station."

"The design of that chariot," I replied, "certainly tallies with the design advocated in that lecture. It would seem to indicate that Palus has accepted the views of that very distinguished lecturer."

"Perhaps," said Agathemer drily. "Perhaps it indicates something more notable."

"Perhaps," I admitted.

Most of the teams were white or dapple gray, those being the favorite colors of all the racing companies except the Whites themselves, among whom it was a tradition that teams of their racing-colors were unlucky for them. Next most frequent were bays, then sorrels, while roans and piebalds, as usual, were distinctly scarce. In fact there were but three teams of roans, all with the white colors, and two of piebalds, one belonging to the Greens and one to the Blues. The Blue team caught my eye, even at so great a distance. When it came opposite us I nudged Agathemer and queried:

"Asper, did you ever see any of these horses before?"

"Yea, Felix," he replied. "You are quite right in your judgment; the left- hand yoke-mate is the very stallion you are thinking of, which you and I have seen and handled before to-day. You and I know where you rode him and how he passed out of your ken."

It was, in fact, the trick stallion I had ridden at Reate fair and won as a prize of my riding him, which had been spirited away from my stables not many nights after he came into my possession. At once I foresaw some attempt at altogether unusual trickery in the course of this racing-day. The team of four splendid piebald stallions, about five years old, was one of the few entered for two races. I could not conjecture how a horse which had spent his youth as trick-horse in possession of an itinerant fakir, had acquired, since I knew him, reputation enough to be yoke-mate in a team highly enough thought of to be entered for two races the same day in the Circus Maximus. This was a puzzle almost as absorbing as the likeness and contrast between the Emperor and Palus.

The racing had many remarkable features, but I am concerned to relate only those in which Palus took part.

At once after the procession he drove in the first race, always a perilous honor. When we saw the chariots dart out of the starting-stalls, the Crimson emerged from the stall furthest to the left, just that which is the worst possible position from which to start. Although thus handicapped the Crimson seemed a horse-length ahead before the other chariots had cleared the sills of their stalls and a full chariot-length ahead before it reached the near end of the spina wall. We saw Palus take the wall easily and hold it throughout the race, after the first turn never less than two full chariot-lengths ahead of the Green, which came second. The Red was third, which comforted Colgius a little. As Palus passed the judges' stand he threw up an arm, with a gesture so boyish, so debonair, so graceful, so altogether characteristic of Commodus, that I felt a qualm all over me. And a second gesture of exultation as he vanished through the Gate of Triumph was equally individual.

The Red won the second race, which put Colgius, Uttius and Ramnius in high good humor and seemed to make their fat, smiling wives even more smiling.

Agathemer and I agreed that the rumors retailed by Colgius concerning the wager said to have been made by Palus were probably correct; for he did just what that rumor specified and so singular and spectacular a series of feats could hardly have been fortuitous. It was quite plain that he pulled in his team in the third race, and let a Gold team get the lead of him and keep it till five eggs and five dolphins had been taken down by the tally- keepers' menials and there were but two full laps to run. Then he took the lead easily in the middle of the straight and won by four full lengths.

So of the other races in which he drove. He pulled in his team at the start and each time allowed to get ahead of him one more team than in his last race. Then he joyously and without apparent effort passed first one, in one straight, then another in another, varying his methods from race to race, watching for and seizing his opportunities, biding his time, dashing into top speed as he chose, all smoothly and in perfect form.

The Blue team of piebalds with my trick-stallion among them won the fourth race in which Palus did not compete.

The eleventh race, in which Palus let the whole field of five precede him, was most exciting, especially because of the length of lead he gave even to the fifth team, and the impression of inevitableness about his victory afterwards. The thirteenth, in which he did not drive, was notable for an appalling smash-up of five chariots, in which three jockeys were killed and eight horses killed outright or so badly injured that the clearing- crew had to put them out of their agonies.

The fourteenth race would have been spoiled by an even worse massacre had it not been for the superlative skill of Palus and his amazing luck. He had passed five of the seven chariots which had the lead of him at the start and was a close third to the two Blue teams, with the entire field well up behind, three abreast, mostly, bunched up in a fashion which seldom happens. The whole dozen had gathered way after the tenth turn, as they came up the straight past the judges and us on the first lap, while two eggs and two dolphins still remained on the tally stands. Two thirds up the straight, just when all twelve teams were at their top speed, the Blue chariot furthest out from the spina wall swerved to the right as if the jockey had lost control of his team. Palus lashed his four and they increased their speed as if they had been held in before and darted between the two Blues. As the twelve horses were nose to nose the outer Blue pulled sharply inward in a way which appeared certain to pocket Palus and wreck his team and chariot, but even more certain to wreck the swerving Blue. What Palus did I was too far off to see, but the roar of delight from the front rows, which spread north, south and west till it sounded like surf in a tempest, advertised that he had done something superlatively adequate. Certainly he slipped between the two Blue teams and won his race handily, as he did every other in succession, though eight, nine, ten and eleven chariots led him at the start of each in succession.

"What do you think of that, Asper?" I asked Agathemer.

"Felix," he replied, "there has never been but one man on earth who could manage horses like that. I've seen him do it. I've been smuggled in to watch him, like many another servant supposed to be waiting for his master outside. I recognize the inimitable witchery of him."

"No need to name him," I said. "But if you are right, who is wearing his robes and occupying his usual seat to-day?"

"Don't ask me!" Agathemer replied. "But you yourself, Felix, who have seen him drive so much oftener than I have must agree with me about Palus."

I was mute.

I never saw a better managed racing-day. The first twelve races of six chariots each were over and done with more than an hour before noon and we had plenty of time to eat the abundant lunch Posilla and her two friends had put up for us, to drink all we wanted of the wine served in the tavern in the vault to the left of the entrance stair, underneath the seats of our section, and to return to our seats, refreshed like the rest of that fraction of the spectators which went out and came back, most of them sitting tight in their seats, unwilling to miss any of the tight-rope- walking, jugglers' tricks, fancy riding and rest of the diversions which filled up the noon interval. Also the twelve afternoon races of twelve chariots each were so promptly started, with so little interval between, that the last race was run a full two hours before sunset, while the light was still strong; stronger, in fact, than earlier in the day, for a sort of film of cloud had mitigated the glare of noon, while by the start of the last race the sky was the deepest, clearest blue and the sun's radiance undimmed by any hindrance.

That last race! Palus passed nine competitors in ten half laps, and, in the first half of the sixth lap, was again third to two Blue teams one of which was the piebald team with the Reate trick-stallion as left-hand yoke-mate. Again, as in the fourteenth race, the field was close up, widespread, bunched, and thundering at top speed. Palus was driving the dapple grays with which he had won the first race.

Now, what happened, happened much quicker than it can be told, happened in the twinkling of an eye. The inner leading Blue team apparently hugged the spina wall too close and jammed its left-hand hub-end against the marble, stopping the chariot, so that the axle and pole slewed and so that the horses, since the pole and the traces did not snap, were brought nose on against the wall and piled up horridly, just at the goal-line, opposite the judges stand, and falling so that as they fell they straightened out the pole and brought the chariot to a standstill with its axle neatly across the course.

The other Blue, with the piebalds, was not close in to the leaders, but fairly well out and about a length behind. As the wall-team piled up something happened among the free-running piebalds. Of course, I conjecture that the trick-stallion threw himself sideways at a signal. But it seems incredible that a creature as timid as a horse, so compellingly controlled by the instinct to keep on its feet, should, in the frenzy of the crisis of a race, while in the mad rush of a full-speed gallop, obey a signal so out of variance with his natural impulse. Agathemer vows he saw the trick-stallion throw himself against the chief horse while he and the other two were running strong and true. I did not see that; I only saw the four piebalds go down in a heap in front of their chariot, saw the chariot stop dead, saw, even at that distance, that its axle was perfectly in line with the axle of the other wrecked chariot, both chariots right side up and too close together for any chariot to pass between them.

Palus, skimming the sand not three horse lengths behind the piebalds, was trapped and certain to be piled up against the wrecked Blues, under three or four more of the field thundering behind him.

Actually, at that distance, I saw his pose, the very outline of his neck and shoulders, express not alarm but exultation. Although his right ear and part of the back of his head was towards me, I could almost see him yell. I could descry how the lash of his whip flew over his team, how craftily he managed his reins.

Right at the narrow gap he drove. In it his horses did not jam or fall or stumble or jostle. The yoke-mates held on like skimming swallows, the trace-mates seemed to rise into the air. I seemed to see the two wheels of his chariot interlock with the two wheels of the upright, stationary wrecked chariots, his left-hand wheel between the chariot-body and right- hand wheel of the chariot on his left, his right-hand wheel between the chariot-body and left-hand wheel of the chariot on his right.

Certainly I saw his chariot, with him erect in it, rise in the air, saw it bump on the ground beyond the two stationary chariots, saw it leap up again from its wheels' impact upon the sand, all four of his dapple grays on their feet and running smoothly, saw him speed on and round the upper goal-posts.

As Palus came round the next lap, well ahead of the diminished field, he craftily avoided the heap of wreckage. As he won he dropped his reins altogether, threw up both, arms, and yelled like a lad. As he vanished through the Triumphal Gateway, he again dropped his reins, left his team to guide themselves, and turned half round to wave an exultant farewell to the spectators.

"What do you think, Asper?" I asked Agathemer.

"Felix," said he, "I wouldn't bet a copper that the occupant of the throne is not Commodus. But I'll wager my amulet-bag and all it contains that Palus is not Ducconius Furfur."

He said it under his breath, that I alone might hear.

"My idea, precisely, Asper," I replied.



CHAPTER XXI

MISADVENTURES

As we left the Circus I heard in the crowd near us, along with fierce denunciations of the Crimsons and Golds, execrated by all the commonality as merely rich men's companies, the most enthusiastic laudations of Palus and expressions of hopes that the Blues, Greens, Reds or Whites, according to the preference of the speaker, might yet win him over and benefit by his prowess.

Colgius, although the Reds had won but five races, was in a high good humor and insisted on the whole party coming in to a family dinner. The three wives occupied the middle sofa, while Agathemer and I had the upper all to ourselves. The fare was abundant and good, with plenty of the cheaper relishes to begin with; roast sucking-pig, cold sliced roast pork, baked ham, and veal stew for the principal dishes, with cabbage, beans and lentils; the wine was passable, and there was plenty of olives, figs, apples, honey and quince marmalade.

The women talked among themselves and the men, with us putting in a word now and then, of Palus. They argued a long time as to just what he did in the fourteenth race and how he had saved himself at the critical moment. As to his victory in the last race, all three of them were loud in their praises. Colgius said:

"Nothing like that has ever happened before. The chariot which Palus drove had the shortest axle I ever saw or anybody else. No other chariot but that could have passed between the two wrecked chariots; any other would have crashed its two wheels against the wrecked chariot-bodies and would have smashed to bits. His chariot was so narrow that its wheels passed between the two chariot-bodies, clear.

"Even so any other chariot would have stopped dead when its wheels hit the axles of the stalled chariots, for it was plain that his wheels interlocked with the wheels of the stalled chariots and hit the axles. But his chariot had the longest spokes ever seen in Rome, or, I believe, anywhere else, and so had the tallest wheels ever seen and had its axle higher above the sand than any other chariot; so its wheels engaged the stalled axles well below their hub-level and so the team pulled them right over the axles and on."

"Yes," said Uttius, "but that never would have happened but for Palus' instantaneous grasp of the situation and lightning decision. Any other charioteer would have reined in or tried to swing round to the right; he lashed his team and guided them so perfectly that, with not a hand's- breadth to spare anywhere, the two wheels passed precisely where there was the only chance of their passing, and he guided his horses so perfectly that the yoke-mates shot between the stalled wheels without jostling them or each other. No man has ever displayed such skill as Palus."

"Nor had such luck," Ramnius cut in. "No man could have guided the yoke- mates as he did and, at the same time, exerted any influence whatever on the trace-mates. They showed their breed. Each saw the stalled wheel in front of him, neither tried to dodge. Each went straight at that wheel, reared at it, and leapt it clean. As they leapt they were not helping to pull the chariot, the yoke-mates pulled it over the stalled axles. But the momentary check as the chariot hit the axles and leapt up gave the leaping trace-mates just the instant of time they needed to find their feet and regain their stride. The whole thing was a miracle; of training, of skill and of luck."

"But don't forget," said Colgius, "that the skill and judgment Palus displayed counted for more than the breed of his team and his luck. Do not forget the perfect form he showed: not an awkward pose, not a sign of effort, not a hint of anxiety; self-possession, courage, self-confidence all through and the most perfect grace of movement, ease, and suggestion of reserve strength. He is a prodigy."

After Agathemer and I were alone in the dark on our cots we whispered to each other a long time.

"Do you really believe," I said, "that Commodus is so insane about horse- racing as to be willing to put Furfur on his throne in his robes so that he can degrade himself under the name of Palus?"

"I do," said Agathemer. "No other conjecture fits what we saw. The man on the throne was certainly the image of Commodus, but had not his elegance of port and grace of movement. Palus has all the inimitable gracefulness which Commodus displayed when driving teams in the Palace Stadium."

"He is incredibly stupid in undervaluing and failing to prize his privileges as Emperor," I said, "and amazingly reckless in allowing anyone else to occupy his throne, wearing his robes."

"He is yet more reckless to race as he does," Agathemer commented, "and I should not be astonished if we have seen his last public appearance as a charioteer."

"Why?" I queried startled.

"Because," said Agathemer, "he must be incredibly stupid not to perceive, now, what opportunities the Circus offers for getting rid of an Emperor posing as a charioteer.

"A stupider man than Commodus can possibly be should be able to comprehend that there must have been a very carefully planned plot in the Blue Company, a plot which must have cost a mountain of gold to carry so far towards success, a plot which never would have been laid for a mere jockey, however much his rivalry threatened the Company's winnings and prestige. Only a coterie of very wealthy men could have devised and pushed it. It cost money to induce charioteers to come so close to almost certain death in order to compass the destruction of another charioteer. It cost money to sacrifice a company's teams in that fashion. Such a plot was never laid to get rid of Palus the jockey; it was aimed at ridding the nobility of an Emperor they fear and hate, however popular he may be with the commonality.

"I miss my guess if there is not a violent upheaval in the Blue Company, and if there is not an investigation scrutinizing the behavior and loyalty of every man affiliated with them, from their board of managers down to the stall-cleaners. I prophesy that the informers, spies and secret- service men will have fat pickings off the Blues for many a day to come. I'll bet the guilty men are putting their affairs in order now and hunting safe hiding-places. Commodus may be insane about horse-racing and fool enough to put a dummy Emperor in his place, so he can be free to enjoy jockeying, but he is no fool when it comes to attempts at assassination. He'll run down the guilty or exterminate them among a shoal of innocents."

I agreed.

But I added:

"What is the world coming to when the Prince of the Republic prizes his privileges so little that he neglects state business for horse-jockeying, when he is so crazy over charioteering that he lets another man wear his robes and occupy his throne? It is a mad world."

Next morning we were early on Orontides' ship and once more Agathemer charmed a crew with his flageolet.

At Ostia Orontides found he must lay over for some valuable packages consigned to a jeweler at Antioch for the conveyance of which he was highly paid. He suggested that, as the day was hot for so late in the year, we go ashore and see the sights which, indeed, we found well worth seeing, for Ostia has some buildings outmatching anything to be found outside of Rome. We took his hint, but he warned us:

"I have some sailors I don't trust. Don't leave anything aboard. Take your wallets with you."

We passed a pleasant, idle day, lunching and taking our siesta at an inn outside the Rome Gate. We had planned to dine at an inn near the harbor- front, on the west side of the town, not far from the Sea Gate: there we had barely sat down and begun tasting the relishes, when in came Clitellus and Summanus. They seemed surprised and pleased to recognize us, greeted us as if we had been old friends and close intimates, appeared to assume that we were as glad to see them as they were to see us, and, as a matter of course, joined us at dinner, telling the waiter-boy to bring them whatever we had ordered, only doubling the quantity of every order.

They talked of the races we had seen, of Palus, of his driving; of the smash-ups, of Posilla, of Colgius and of everything and anything. They announced that they would accompany us to our ship and see us safe aboard. Both Agathemer and I more than suspected that they had associates in waiting to follow them and, at a signal, fall on us and seize us. I felt all that and Agathemer whispered to me a word or two in Greek which advised me of his suspicions.

We prolonged our meal all we could, but there was no shaking them off. Agathemer ordered more wine, Falernian, and had it mixed with only one measure of water. Watching his opportunity he threw at me, in a whisper, two Greek words which advised me, since they were the first in a well- known quotation from Menander, that our only hope was to drink our tormentors dead drunk.

It turned out to be a question whether we would drink them drunk or they us. Certainly they showed no hesitation about pouring down the wine as fast as it was mixed and served, nor did either of them appear to notice that we drank less than they; they seemed able to hold any amount and stay sober and keep on drinking. As dusk deepened and the waiter-boys lit the inn lamps, I found myself perilously near sliding off my chair to the floor and very doubtful whether, if I did, I should be able to get up again or to resist my tendency to go to sleep then and there.

I was, in fact, just about to give up any attempt to resist my impulse to collapse when Summanus collapsed, slid to the floor, rolled over, spread out and snored.

Clitellus thickly objurgated his comrade and all weak-heads, worthless fellows who could not drink a few goblets without getting drunk. To prove his vast superiority and his prowess, he poured more wine down his throat, spilling some down into his tunic.

Agathemer winked at me and fingered the strap of his wallet. I groped for mine and fumbled at it.

Clitellus, with a hiccough, slid to the floor beside Summanus.

I was for trying to rise.

"Let us be sure," said Agathemer in Greek, "perhaps they are pretending to be drunk, just to catch us."

But, after a brief contemplation of the precious pair, we concluded that no acting could be as perfect as this reality. They were drunk at last and safely asleep.

Agathemer paid the whole amount, for all four of us, adjured the waiter- boy to be good to Clitellus and Summanus, gave him an extra coin, and signalled me to rise. I lurched to my feet, swaying, almost as drunk as our victims and beholding Agathemer swaying before me, not only because of my blurred eyesight, but also because of his unsteadiness on his feet.

We almost fell, but not quite. Somehow we staggered to the door, where, once outside, the cool night air made us feel almost sobered, though still too nearly drunk to be sure of our location or direction.

More by luck than anything else we took the right turn and found the harbor front before the night was entirely black. In the half gloom we tried to find the pier from which we had come that morning. As we explored we heard a cheerful hail.

"Is that you, Orontides?"

Agathemer called.

"Aye, Aye!" came back the cheery answer. "Come aboard!"

And we were met and assisted up the gang-plank and down over the bulwarks.

"I was afraid you boys were lost," the shipmaster said, "and I am to sail at dawn, after all; everything is aboard. I'm glad to see you. You've dined pretty liberally. Come over here and get to sleep."

And he led us to where we found something soft to sleep on.

I was asleep almost as soon as I lay down.

I awoke with a terrific headache and an annoying buzzing in my ears, awoke only partially, not knowing where I was or why and without any distinct recollections of recent events. My first sensation was discomfort, not only from the pain of my headache, but also from the heat of the sunrays beating on me, and that despite the fact that I could feel a strong cool breeze ruffling my hair and beard.

I sat up and looked about me. Agathemer was snoring. The sun was not low; in fact, at that time of the year, it was near its highest. I had slept till noon!

Then, all of a sudden I realized that the ship was wholly strange to me and that it was headed not southeast, but northwest. That realization shocked me broad awake. At the same instant I saw the shipmaster approaching. He was not Orontides, nor was he at all like him. He had small feet, was knock-kneed, tall, lean, had a hatchet-face and red hair.

"Awake at last!" he commented. "You lads must have dined gloriously last night. You don't look half yourselves, yet."

He stared at me, and at Agathemer, who had waked, into much the same sort of daze in which I had been at first.

"Neptune's trident!" the shipmaster exclaimed. "You two aren't the two lads I was to convoy! Who are you and how did you get here?"

"We were hunting for our ship after dark," Agathemer said, "and somebody hailed us. We asked whether it was Orontides and the answer that came back was: 'Aye, Aye!' We were pretty thoroughly drunk and were glad to be helped aboard and shown our beds. That's all I know."

"Kingdom of Pluto!" the shipmaster cried, "my name's Gerontides, not Orontides. I heard your question, but you were so drunk I never knew the difference: probably I shouldn't have known the difference if you had been sober. I was on the lookout for two lads much like you two who had part paid me to carry them to Genoa. They'll be in a fix."

"'Bout ship," said Agathemer, "and put back to Ostia. You can't be far on your way yet. We'll pay you what you ask to set us ashore at Ostia."

"I wouldn't 'bout ship," said Gerontides, "for twenty gold pieces."

"We'll pay you thirty," said Agathemer.

"Don't bid any higher, son," Gerontides laughed. "If you were made of gold, to Genoa you go. I've a bigger stake in a quick landing at Genoa than any sum you could name would overbalance. Best be content!"

And content we had to be, no arguments, no entreaties, nothing would move him.

"I'll be fair with you," he said. "The lads I took you for had paid me all I had asked them except one gold piece each on landing at Genoa. That's all you'll have to pay me."

Nothing would budge him from his resolution. Agathemer in despair drowned his misery in flageolet playing. It seemed to comfort him and certainly comforted me. The crew were delighted. After a voyage as easy and pleasant as our cruise with Maganno, we landed on the eighth day before the Ides of September, at Genoa, paid our two gold pieces and set about getting out of that city as quickly as might be. We avoided, of course, the posting- station where we had changed horses while in couriers' trappings. But there was a posting-station at each gate of Genoa and we, having talked over all possibilities in the intervals of flageolet playing, were for Dertona. We had little trouble in buying a used travelling-carriage. Horses we did not have to wait long for, as hiring teams were luckily plentiful that day and Imperial agents scarce. Off we set for Milan.

We were in haste but there was no hurrying postillions on those mountain roads. We nooned at some nameless change-house and were glad to make the thirty-six miles to Libarium by dusk. The next day was consumed in covering the thirty-five miles to Dertona. From there on we travelled, in general down hill, and so quicker, but not much quicker, so that a third day entire was needed for making the fifty-one miles to Placentia.

Placentia, a second time, was unlucky for us. It might have been worse, for we did not again encounter Gratillus, or anyone else who might have recognized me. But I made a fool of myself. I am not going to tell what happened; Agathemer never reproached me for my folly, not even in our bitterest misery; but I reproached myself daily for nearly three years; I am still ashamed of myself and I do not want to set down my idiotic behavior.

Let it suffice, that, through no fault of Agathemer's, but wholly through my fault, we were suspected, interrogated, arrested, stripped, our brand- marks and scourge-scars observed and ourselves haled before a magistrate. To him Agathemer told the same tale he had told to Tarrutenus Spinellus. It might have served had we been dealing with a man of like temper, for travellers from Aneona for Aquileia regularly passed through Placentia turning there from northwest along the road from Aneona to northeast along the road to Aquileia.

But Stabilius Norbanus was a very different kind of man.

"Your story may be true," he said, "but it impresses me as an ingenious lie. If I believed it I'd not send men like you, with their records written in welts on their backs, with any convoy, no matter how strict, on the long journey to Aquileia, on which you'd have countless opportunities of escape. I do not believe your tale. Yet I'll pay this much attention to it: I'll write to Vedius Aquileiensis and ask him if he owned two slaves answering your descriptions and lost them through unexplained disappearance or known crimping by Dalmatian pirates at about the time you indicate.

"Meantime I'll commit you to an ergastulum [Footnote: See Note H.] where you'll be herded with your kind, all safely chained, so that no escape is possible, and all doing some good to the state by some sort of productive labor. A winter at the flour-mills will do you two good."

Our winter at the mills may have benefited us, but it was certainly, with its successor at similar mills, one of the two most wretched winters of my life. And Agathemer, I think, suffered every bit as acutely as I. We were not chained, except for a few days and about twice as many more nights; as soon as the manager of the ergastulum felt that he knew us he let us go unchained like the rest of his charges.

This was because of the structure of the ergastulum. It was located in the cellars of one of the six or more granaries of Placentia, which has, near each city gate, an extensive public store-house. The granary under which we were immured was that near the Cremona gate. Above ground it was a series of rectangles about courtyards each just big enough to accommodate four carts, all unloading or loading at once. It was everywhere of four stories of bin-rooms, all built of coarse hard-faced rubble concrete. The cellars were very extensive, and not all on one level, being cunningly planned to be everywhere about the same depth underground. Where their floor-levels altered the two were joined by short flights of three, four or five stone steps, under a vaulted doorway, in the thick partition walls.

Each cellar-floor was about four yards below the ground level so that a tall man, standing on a tall man's shoulders, could barely reach with his outstretched fingers the tip of the sill of one of the low windows. These windows, each about a yard high and two yards broad, were heavily barred with gratings of round iron bars as thick as a man's wrist, set too close together for a boy's head to pass between them, and each two bars hot- welded at each intersection, so that each grating was practically one piece of wrought iron, made before the granary was built and with the ends of each bar set deep in the flinty old rubble concrete. The inmates need not be chained, as no escape was possible through the windows, though raw night air, rain, snow at times and the icy winter blasts came in on us through them.