The murder or assassination or execution of Julianus on the Kalends of June shocked Falco even more than the deaths of Commodus and Pertinax. As the June days passed I had to exercise my greatest adroitness to keep him from spending all his waking hours indoors, chiefly in moping about his collection of gems. I did pretty well with him, for I wheedled him into going to the Baths of Titus three afternoons out of four, into going out to dine one evening in three, and I even induced him to give several formal dinners, each of which was a great success.
But, if I left him to himself, I invariably found him glooming over the gems which no longer gave him any real pleasure. And I could not blame him. Indoors one felt reasonably safe in Rome that June, for no residences had been broken into anywhere in the city, though many shops had been looted and some burnt. But, in the streets, the insolence of the Praetorians was unendurable and their unbridled license and arrogance terrorized the entire population, especially the upper classes. Going anywhere in broad daylight was dangerous, even going to the Baths of Titus from the Esquiline was risky. Anyone like Falco was certain to feel safer indoors. And the tense uncertainty of those twenty-four days made everybody restless, feverish, fidgety and morose: civil war between Severus and Pescennius Niger, lord of the East, was inevitable. How Clodius Albinus, in control of Gaul, Spain and Britain, would act, was problematical. We were all keyed-up, apprehensive and wretched.
Our suspense was shorter since it turned out that Severus had made up his mind and begun to make his rapid and effective arrangements as soon as he heard of the murder of Pertinax. Pertinax was murdered on the fifth day before the Kalends of April and so swiftly travelled the imperial couriers who were his friends and who arranged to set out at once and carry Severus the news, that the first of them rode more than eight hundred miles in eight days and reached him at Caruntum in Pannonia on the Nones of April. Severus was cautious, kept secret what he had heard and moved seventy-two miles nearer Rome to Sabaria in Pannonia, where, after the news was confirmed beyond question, he harangued the soldiers and was by them saluted Emperor on the Ides of April. At once he assured himself of the support or acquiescence of his officers and won over the local authorities and garrisons all over Illyricum, Noricum and Rhaetia. Bands of his most trusted soldiers set off towards Rome by every road. He gathered his forces, made sure of their loyalty and began his march. He was already at Aquileia when the news of the death of Julianus reached him there on the Nones of June. He marched straight to Rome and on the tenth day before the Kalends of July, the day of the summer solstice, was outside the city, accompanied by the delegation of senators who had met him at Interamnia and surrounded by the six hundred picked men who acted as his personal guards, who, it was rumored, had not taken off their corselets day nor night since they left Sabaria.
The next day, the ninth day before the Kalends of July, we heard with amazement that the Praetorians had been cowed, had surrendered their standards to Severus and had been disarmed. Certainly knots of them hung about the streets and squares, all in ordinary tunics and rain hats, shorn of their uniforms as well as of their weapons, and looking not only humbled but frightened. It was rumored that all of those directly concerned with the murder of Pertinax had been not only disarmed and stripped of their uniforms, but actually stripped naked and scourged out of the camp by the Illyrian legionaries who had surrounded and cowed them, and ordered to flee the neighborhood of Rome and never again to approach within a hundred miles of the capitol.
From noon of that day the whole city was in a ferment, preparing for the entry on the morrow of our new Emperor. This was acclaimed the most magnificent spectacle ever beheld in Rome; certainly I was never spectator of anything so impressive. The day was fair, almost cloudless, mild and warm, but pleasant with a gentle breeze. From where Falco and I viewed the procession, nearer the Forum, we gazed about on a wondrous picture: the blue sky above, under it a frame of roofs, mostly of red tiles, some of green weathered bronze among them giving variety, and here and there a temple roof of silver gleaming in the sun, not a few gilded and flashing.
As far as we could see about us every balcony was hung with tapestries gay with particolored patterns, every doorway and window was wreathed in flowers, countless braziers sent up columns of scented smoke. The streets were lined with throngs habited in togas newly whitened; spectators of both sexes, the men in white togas, their women in the brightest silks, crowded every window, loggia, balcony, roof, and other viewpoint. The chattering of the crowds ceased when the head of the procession appeared, and, in a breathless hush, we saw leading it on horseback, with two mounted aides, Flavius Juvenalis, who had been third and last Prefect of the Praetorium to Julianus and who, as an honorable gentleman and loyal official, had been confirmed and continued in this post by Severus. Behind him tramped, in serried ranks, an entire legion of the Pannonian troops, in full armor with their great shields gleaming and the sun sparkling on their gilded helmets and their spear-points.
Behind them came ten of the elephants with which Julianus, in his futile, bungling attempts at preparations for resistance, had had some of his men drill. Each now carried in his tower eight Danubians, four tall Dacian spearmen and four Scythian archers, bow in hand, leaning over the edge of the howdah.
Behind the elephants came Norican legionaries carrying the surrendered standards of the disbanded Praetorian Guard; not held aloft, but trailed, half inverted.
Then, amid roars of cheers, came Severus himself, habited not in his general's regalia, but in the gorgeous Imperial robes, as if already in the Palace and about to give a public levee. Though thus clad as in time of peace and walking all the way on foot, he was hedged about by his faithful six hundred, every man stepping alertly, helmet-plumes waving, helmets glittering, shields gleaming, spear-points asparkle, kilt-straps flapping, scabbards clanking, a grim advertisement of irresistible power.
After this guard walked our entire Senate, and, as the Emperor and Senate acknowledged the acclamations of the onlookers, passing amid thunders of cheering, behind we saw a long serpent ribbon of Illyrian legionaries, every man fully armed and armored as for instant battle, their even tramp sounding grim and monotonous when the cheerers paused for breath, their resistless might manifest. Indubitably Rome belonged to Severus, he was our master.
Falco, hopeful, yet awed, said little. Once inside his housewalls he fled to his beloved gems and solaced himself with them till it was time for his bath, which he took in his private bathrooms. He and I dined alone and talked chiefly of our hopes of the new Emperor. Falco particularly remarked his appearance of hard commonsense, ruthless decision and flinty resolve.
Next day, soon after dawn, we heard many rumors of disorders by the Illyrian troops, of their having used temples for barracks that night, of cook-shops forced to feed them without payment, of shops plundered and pedestrians robbed. Naturally the entire household kept indoors, except such slaves as went out for fresh vegetables, fruits and fish. I solaced myself by reading the Tragedies of Ennius. I read parts of his Hector, Achilles, Neoptolemus, Ajax and Andromache, with much emotion, and especially the Bellerophon, forgetting everything else. Then I slept until late in the afternoon.
Waking I bathed unhurriedly and then went to call Falco, who liked to bathe at the last possible moment before dinner. I walked round the rear gallery of the peristyle, sure of finding him among his jewels. The door of the middle room was not shut, and barely ajar. Against the sill of the door, on the brown and white mosaic pavement of the gallery, a glint of color caught my eye. I stooped and picked up a fine uncut emerald, one of Falco's chief treasures.
A qualm of apprehension shot through me. I pushed the door, entered and swept the room with a glance. A confusion of jewel-trays cluttered the floor, no sign of Falco. Nor was he in the left-hand room, which had been similarly rifled.
But, when I turned and peered through the right-hand inner door I saw, across the marble center-table, horridly sprawled, what I instantly knew for his corpse, so unmistakably did the head hang loose, the arms dangle, the legs trail: he was manifestly a corpse, even without sight of the dagger-hilt projecting from his back.
I rushed to him and touched him.
He was yet warm, the blood still trickled from about the dagger, driven deep under the left shoulder blade, slanting upwards, the very stroke Agathemer had drilled me in early in our flight, the stroke with which I had slaughtered two of the five bullies at Nona's hut!
I plucked out the dagger, gazing at it in horror.
As I did so I heard footsteps behind me and turned to face Casperius Asellio, and Vespronius Lustralis, two of the most persistent of the toadies who hung about Falco, both of whom hated me consumedly.
In a flash I realized my situation. Had I been a freeman I should have been commiserated by all as a gentleman who had had the misfortune to find his best friend foully murdered; as a slave I would be assumed by all Rome to have been caught in the act of assassinating my kind and indulgent master; and, recalling Tanno's invectives against me at my last dinner at Villa Andivia, I knew I was liable to be tortured until I confessed my guilt!
Asellio and Lustralis flung themselves on me with execrations and their yells brought the entire household. My protestations were unheeded. No one would listen to my valet's assertion that he had found the janitor asleep in his cell and roused him just before Lustralis and Asellio reached the entrance, that he had but just finished dressing me when he went down to the vestibule. No one heeded my denials or my urgings that I could not have rifled the collection, that the looters and the murderers must be the same individuals, that I was clearly innocent. Asellio and Lustralis not merely seized me, but rained blows on me. I knew I could knock both senseless without half trying, but, in my character of effeminate oriental exquisite, I must not advertise my real strength. I struggled, but half- heartedly.
The house-boys and any of Falco's retinue who could reach me, thumped me and mauled me. I was horrified to realize all of a sudden that those who had made most of me had always envied me in secret; that, to a man, they hated me; that each and all would use every effort to ensure my ruin; that I had to face perjury, unanimous perjury, gushing from an abundant well- head of malignity, spite, and enmity. My valet alone seemed on my side, and he could assist me not at all.
I was bound with ropes knotted till my hands and feet swelled, till the cords cut into my flesh. I was abused, my clothing torn till I was half naked. I was whacked and clawed till I was bleeding in a dozen places; I was reviled, jeered at and threatened. Trussed like a fowl to be roasted, I was half hustled half dragged, almost carried, down into the courtyard. From there, after no long wait, I was haled off to the slaves' prison in the Slave-Dealers' Exchange next the Slave-Market. There I was released from my bonds, heavy shackles were riveted on my ankles and I was cast into the lower dungeon.
I had had time to tell Dromo, my faithful valet, to inform Agathemer. I knew he, in turn, would inform Tanno and Vedia. I was certain that they would do all that they could. But I dreaded that they could do nothing. I was despondent, despairing. Actually, Dromo must have been clever, prompt and judicious, and Agathemer equally quick and resourceful, with the fullest possible help from Tanno and Vedia, and they must have taxed to the utmost their influence and their means.
After a night almost sleepless I was visited at dawn by no less a person than Galen himself.
"My boy," he said, "you, are in a terrible situation and we were in a quandary how to advise you. But, after much discussion, we are agreed that you have some chance of life as Phorbas the slave, accused of murdering his master, whereas you have no chance at all as Andivius Hedulio, proscribed along with Egnatius Capito. Our new Emperor seems to feel that all enemies of former Princes are foes of his; he seems to have ordered his agents to be on the lookout for all living persons accused, relegated, or banished under Julianus, Pertinax and Commodus. Those taken in Rome have been promptly executed. By all means, whatever happens to you, whatever threatens you, give no hint that you are Andivius Hedulio. Endure what befalls and hope for life and safety and ultimate rehabilitation.
"Of course I can see you as often as I please without exciting any suspicion. You were, while yourself and prosperous, only one of my countless patients, never among those I made much of. You, as Phorbas, have been under my special care, as the darling of poor Falco, who was one of my best friends, though I had known him so short a time. My visits here cannot prejudice your welfare and may help you, even save you.
"Cheer up! Agathemer says that the real murderers are certain to betray themselves by attempting to dispose of some of the stolen gems. He is right. And he had taken measures to ensnare them. He has warned or is warning every gem-dealer in Rome, from Orontides himself down to the most disreputable scoundrel who makes a living by exchanging his cash for stolen gems. He has sent off despatches already along many postroads, by the couriers who set out at dawn, notifying all gem-dealers in the towns along these roads to be on the watch for the miscreants. He will continue this until the warning is all over Italy from Rhegium and Brundisium to the Alps, and that within a few days. Those precious gentry are certain to be nabbed either in Rome or elsewhere. Whenever they are identified and in durance it will be easy to clear you.
"Meanwhile you will be tried as a slave accused of murdering his master and the investigation will include the questioning of every slave in the house at the time of the murder. I know you are aquiver with dread of torture; there will be torture, but I assure you you will not be tortured. As much can be done today by influence and bribery as could be done under Perennis or Cleander, only it cannot be done so crudely and openly, and much else can be done openly.
"We have endeavored to arrange to have you tried by a bunch of jurymen presided over by a praetor, just as if you were a freeman, according to Hadrian's law. But Commodus had repealed all such laws mitigating the rigors of procedure in the case of slaves and Severus has not had them reenacted. So you will be tried by a magistrate, a deputy of the Prefect of the City, as slaves were tried before Hadrian's time.
"We shall have, at the trial, to cheer you up, to counsel you, and, if necessary, to intervene in your behalf, as clever an advocate as any in Rome. Keep up a good heart, and read these letters."
And he went off.
I had a proof of the truth of what he said of bribery within half an hour, for I was bathed, my hurts dressed, and I was clothed in new, clean and comfortable garments and served with abundant eatable food and good wine.
I had promptly read the letters.
Agathemer's Galen had anticipated, mostly. Besides briefly telling me of his measures for detecting the murderers, and prophesying their success, he assured me of his devotion and alertness to take advantage of any chance to help me.
Tanno pledged me his utmost efforts to assist me, and emphasized his hope that the influences which he and Vedia could enlist in my behalf and the cash at their disposal would protect me from the worst horrors of trial as a slave and would ultimately clear me and free me from danger.
Vedia wrote:
"The Leopard-Tamer's bride gives greeting to the Leopard-Tamer. Keep up your courage! Do not be despondent, but have a hopeful heart. All that gold, all that influence can do for you, shall be done. Cheer up! You will live to see yourself a free man, unsmirched by any accusation, you and I will be married and live many years of happiness afterwards: Farewell."
Investigations of murders are prompt in Rome and trials of accused slaves quickly disposed of. Before the next morning was half way to noon, on the fifth day before the Ides of July, I found myself, still shackled, but well fed and well clad, in the Basilica Sempronia, before the magistrate charged with deciding such cases. He turned out to be young Lollius Corbulo, whom I had not set eyes on until he came to know me as Phorbas, for he was an art amateur of high standing, considering his youth.
I never have discovered how much he was influenced by his natural kindliness of disposition, how much by personal regard for me, how much by Tanno, acting for himself and Vedia, whether he had been bribed or not. He, when I questioned him in after years, passed it off with a smile saying that anyone would accept a gift on condition of doing what he meant to do uninfluenced, that no one needed a gift to make him do the right thing. From Agathemer, Tanno and Vedia I have never been able to extract any admissions as to their activities in my behalf. Anyhow Corbulo gave a demonstration of the great latitude which is permitted both by law and custom to such a magistrate in such a case. He ordered my shackles removed, and, while they were being filed through, sent off three of his apparitors in charge of Dromo to fetch some of my own garments from my apartments in Falco's house.
He went about his investigation like a fair-minded man who meant to favor no one and to ferret out the exact truth.
Corbulo in his full senatorial attire, the broad crimson stripe more conspicuous than the white of his toga, sat in his chair at the center of the apse of the basilica, his apparitors behind him. In the nave of the basilica, surrounded by guards, were herded those members of Falco's retinue who had been in his house at the time of his murder. Further down the nave were many outsiders, come to listen to the trial. In the aisles were gathered hangers-on of the court. In the apse, to the left and right of the tribunal, stood many of Falco's friends, among whom I recognized Casperius Asellio and Vespronius Lustralis. Among those on the other side of the magistrate were Tanno and Galen.
The bare, bleak interior of the ancient, old-fashioned basilica, with its blackened roof-beams, unadorned walls, Travertine columns of the severest Tuscan pattern, and plain window-lattices, made an austere setting for the trial. I saw nowhere any rack, winches, horse, or any other engine or torture; but, while Dromo was gone, four muscular court-slaves came tramping In, each supporting a pole end. The two long poles were passed through the four ear-handles of a bronze brazier all of five feet square, level full of glowing charcoal, the brilliant bed of coals radiating an intense heat perceptible as they passed near me. When they had set it down in full view of all and near the tribunal one of them shook out and folded four-thick a thin Spanish blanket of harsh wiry wool and spread the square of it by the brazier, squatting on it to tend the coals with a long- handled five pronged altar-hook.
When Dromo returned with my garments and I was clad as Phorbas, Corbulo questioned me as to when Falco had bought me, where and from whom. To my relief he did not ask me how Rufius Libo had acquired me. He did ask my age, but nothing else concerning my past. As to my life with Falco in Africa and at Rome, he questioned me closely. I told him all about Falco's character, his gem-collecting, the effect on him of the murders of Commodus and Pertinax, his forebodings and his utterances to me about his will. When he felt that he knew all I had to tell along these lines, he said:
"Now tell me your version of your master's death."
He heard me out and said:
"I believe you. You speak like a truth-teller."
He then questioned the janitor, who babbled and cringed, half unintelligibly, but stoutly denying that he had slept at his post on the seventh day before the Kalends of July.
"I am of the opinion," said Corbulo, drily, "that you are lying."
Then to his apparitors he said:
"Strip him."
The court-slave, the charcoal-tender, stood up off his folded blanket and shook it out. The janitor, stripped and bound, ankles lashed, hands trussed behind him, was haled towards the brazier. The blanket was flung round him and four apparitors lifted him as if he had been a log and held him near the brazier, the enveloping blanket drawn tight over his left thigh and its outer underside nearest the coals, tilting him sideways to bring the soft thickness of the thigh closest to the heat. They watched the tight blanket over his thigh and moved him a little away from the brazier when the wool began to smoke.
I had never seen nor heard of this kind of torture, but it seemed effectual. The fellow writhed, groaned, squalled and protested. After Corbulo had him brought back before him he confessed that he had been asleep in his cell from some time before Falco's murder until he was aroused by Dromo, just before the arrival of Casperius and Vespronius.
One by one the other slaves were questioned. Three declared that they had seen the janitor asleep not long before they heard the alarm.
Several more testified that the janitor had often been asleep. More than half of them confirmed my story of the theft of the silver on the Nones of May. Except the janitor not one was tortured, though Corbulo threatened with torture several who hesitated in their testimony.
After the slaves Corbulo questioned Asellio and Lustralis.
Then, when they had stood aside, he gazed about at the spectators in the nave, at the crowd behind them, interested in the next case or in others to come up later, at the hangers-on in the side aisles; for a time, mute, he stared at the glowing charcoal fire in the big brazier.
When he spoke he said:
"It is my opinion that Phorbas is innocent. I have inspected the house where the murder took place. From the condition of the looted rooms it is plain that more jewelry was stolen than any one man could carry off. Manifestly two men participated in the robbery and murder and escaped with their booty, very likely the same pair who robbed Falco'stricliniumon the Nones of May. The janitor's confessed delinquency explains how they entered and got away unhindered and unseen. The dead man's heirs should punish the janitor. I hold no other slave at fault. Has any man anything which he wishes to say before I pass formal judgment for official record?' Lustralis asked permission to speak and amazed me by his fluency, his ingratiating delivery, his vehemence, his ingenuity and the fantastic malignity of his contentions. Corbulo heard him out to the end, unmoving as a statue.
"You do not look like a lunatic nor act like one, Lustralis," he said, "but you talk like one. Phorbas has impressed me by every feature of his tale. He appears to have told the truth. He seems to have been a sincere friend to his late master. I cannot credit the wild suggestion that a man of his character would plot his master's death, or that a man of his intelligence, with a full knowledge of the terms of his master's will, would expose himself to suspicion by so plotting; far less that such a man as he would ignore the perils of such a crime and so desire his freedom and the legacies promised him as to league himself with two criminals, assist them to enter the house and to escape from it, and hope to come off unscathed and unsuspected and forever unbetrayed.
"But, suppose all you imagine and insinuate is true in fact. Prove it! Produce the two robbers. Prove them the robbers by recovering their booty. If they, so convicted of the robbery, are brought before me, if they accuse Phorbas of being their accomplice, if they tell a consistent and convincing tale, if any colorable motive for such association and such a crime can be alleged against Phorbas, then I'll believe him guilty, and not till then."
He eyed Lustralis, who spoke further.
"Torture Phorbas!" Corbulo cried. "Absurd! In my court I never torture men like him, any more than if they were freemen. And though it might be imperative to torture him for a confession if all the testimony pointed to his guilt, it is ridiculous to suggest torturing him merely to corroborate evidence demonstrating his innocence.
"I, hereby, officially as the representative of the Commonwealth, pronounce Phorbas cleared of all charges connected with this case. I hereby enjoin all men to assist the Republic to detect and apprehend the murderers who robbed Falco and killed him."
Lustralis and Asellio looked baffled and sour. A murmur of approval ran through the bystanders. My fellow-slaves congratulated each other and rejoiced, save only the janitor.
Galen approached me.
"Phorbas," he said, "as you are now a freeman by your late master's will, which will soon be read and its provisions put into effect, at which reading I shall be present as one of the legatees, you may now go where you like. I invite you to come with me."
I thanked Corbulo, who said:
"Don't thank me. I did just what any sane, clear-headed, fair-minded magistrate must do, affirmed the manifest truth."
Galen led me off to a modest apartment near the Carinae. I found everything prepared for my comfort, slaves to wait on me and nothing omitted. I thanked him.
"Tanno," he said, "deputed me to hire this lodging for you. He has kept in the background. These are my slaves, put at your disposal and enjoined to obey you as they would obey me in person. Keep quiet here till I can arrange for you to take possession of your legacies from Falco. I think he left you all your personal belongings and the slaves who waited on you. As soon as the necessary formalities are completed I'll send them to you.
"Do not attempt to communicate with Vedia or Tanno. Do nothing which might betray you as your actual self. Our new Emperor seems resolute to exterminate, to the last individual, all persons implicated in any conspiracy not only against Julianus or Pertinax, but against Commodus, from the date of his accession. All such persons apprehended are promptly executed. Keep quiet. Efface yourself till I give you the word. I can communicate with you freely, can see you daily, if need be, since I am one of poor Falco's heirs and was your physician during his life here in Rome. I'll do all I can for you."
He left and I bathed, ate, and slept the rest of that day and slept sound all night.
Next day passed similarly. But, early on the following day, the third day before the Kalends of July, not long after sunrise, my new valet came to me his face ashen. He babbled some unintelligible syllables and before I could comprehend him, my bedroom was entered by a Pannonian sergeant, grim as the centurions from Britain who had liberated Agathemer and me from theergastulumat Placentia. Behind him were four legionary soldiers. I was rearrested!
I was promptly haled off to the same prison where Galen had visited me three days before. There I was again deprived of my garments and clad in others, new, but of cheap material, coarse and uncomfortable. Also shackles, heavier shackles, were at once riveted on my ankles, and I was again consigned to the lower dungeon. I was, to be sure, given good and abundant food and wine not too unpalatable. Otherwise I had no indulgences and there I spent the night.
Next day, the last day of June, Galen again visited me.
"My lad," he said, "the first rule of medicine is to cheer up the patient, but I must say that your case looks grave and I have little cheer for you. I shall do my best and so will Tanno, Vedia and Agathemer. But we are all dazed. We cannot understand what has happened, nor who has brought it to pass, nor what influences are working against us.
"But someone has gotten the ear of Juvenalis or of Severus himself. It has been represented plausibly to the Prefect of the Praetorium, or perhaps even to the Emperor in person, that the courts here in Rome have fallen into a shocking state of disrepute on account of decisions in scandalous contravention of the evidence, brought about by favoritism and bribery. It has also been plausibly represented that the slave-population has little respect for the lives or property of their masters, less loyalty towards them and very little dread of punishment. Your alleged murder of poor Falco is held up as a flagrant example of the latter condition, your acquittal as an even more flagrant instance of the degradation of the courts.
"Believing that a shocking miscarriage of justice has taken place concerning an atrocious crime, the Prefect or the Prince has ordered you rearrested and retried, tomorrow, this time before Cassius Ravillanus."
I shuddered, not metaphorically, but actually. I felt cold all over, as if plunged into an icy mountain stream. Ravillanus claimed as his ancestor Cassius Ravilla and aimed at emulating him. Certainly, as a magistrate, he quite frankly talked and acted as if acquittal were a disgrace to the court, and the object of each trial not impartial justice but the conviction of the accused. He was perfectly sincere, upright in every intention, incorruptible, fanatical, self-opinionated, austere, ascetic, stern and harsh. I shuddered again and again at the thought of him.
"Ravillanus has the reputation of being unbribable," Galen went on, 'and it is a question whether an attempt at bribery might not prejudice your case more than letting matters be. Yet I have employed an agent far too clever to bungle any approach, and something may be done for you. Vedia is despondent, but resolute to keep her head and help you all she can, and she has cash to spare and much influence. Tanno has even more of both. Agathemer is hopeful of running down the real murderers, as they are loaded with their booty. If they are caught we can clear you.
"Keep up a brave heart."
I tried to, but it was impossible. I ate little and slept hardly at all.
The next day, the Kalends of July, saw me haled again to the BasilicaSempronia.
There I beheld a scene almost a duplicate of my first trial; a similar throng of spectators, very similar bevies of expectant witnesses, advocates and prosecutors; the same batch of my former fellow-slaves, surrounded by the same guards; the very same charcoal-brazier tended by the same slave squatting on the same folded blanket; similar knots of notables in the apse, about and behind the magistrate's tribunal; the same carved arm-chair; in it not Corbulo, but Cassius Ravillanus, lean, dry, tanned, leathery, smooth-shaven, bald and stern.
He glared at me when my guards halted me four yards or so in front of him; then he beckoned to one of his apparitors and spoke to him in an undertone. The fellow went off as if on an errand.
Ravillanus then gave, even more positively than Corbulo, a demonstration of the great latitude permitted such a magistrate in procedure, of how completely it lies within his discretion what to do and how to do it.
"Fellow!" he ranted, "you have plotted to rob and murder your master, you have done both and you have, by favor and influence and perhaps even by bribery, arranged for your easy acquittal. I am charged by the Prince of the Republic to see to it, that the majesty of the law, the sacredness of the lives of Roman noblemen, and the security of their property be publicly vindicated: I am here to undo all that Lollius Corbulo supinely allowed to be done. You shall perceive that I am wholly unlike any such trifler. Of one feature only of his procedure do I approve. I highly acclaim his notions as to the right kind of torture. Slaves like you, however pampered, are property, like horses or cattle. Their value lies in their usefulness. Any slave, after torture, should be as useful to his owners as before. If a slave is placed upon the horse and weights hung to his feet, his legs are often made helpless, he cannot ever walk again, he is a cripple. Still oftener does the rack leave a slave utterly useless. Our courts have always desired some form of torture by which the recalcitrant could be made to suffer acute pain, but not in any way injured. Lollius has introduced a torture which never injures anyone subjected to it, but which causes extreme agony while in use. Only stretch a hard-yarn Spanish blanket over a thigh, draw it tight and hold the thigh at just the right distance from just the right size of brazier with its coals properly tended, and the subject can be made to tell the truth; but not broiled alive, for the blanket will singe before the flesh under it cooks. You had best tell the truth, not such an ingenious string of lies as you told before Lollius."
Then he had all my fellow-slaves brought up and ranged before him.
"Your master," he said, "has been foully done to death. If the guilt of this hideous crime can be indubitably fastened upon one of you or two or any few, the rest of you shall be held innocent and shall suffer no penalties. If no facts can be ascertained limiting the guilt to some of you, all of you, according to the ancient law concerning such cases, shall be put to death by crucifixion or exposure to the beasts in the arena, as our Prince may prefer. I have no desire to send to death any guiltless man. I enjoin you all to tell the truth and to assist the law. The truth- tellers will suffer less of the torture."
He then, beginning with the scullions, had every boy and man tortured over the brazier, asking no question of any till he had felt the heat of the fire and had begun to yell for mercy. Then he would interrupt the torture, question the victim, bid the torturers again hold their subject close to the fire; and again suspend the torture and ask questions. Naturally the victims, frantic with pain and terror, said whatever they thought would get them off.
Also, to my horror, I realized for the first time, what I had only vaguely suspected before, how venomously they had envied me, how violently embittered most of them were against me, how they had hated their master's favorite. They were glad to slander me, they enjoyed assisting at my ruin, they relished the prospect of my being tortured and executed. Moreover it appeared that they had been carefully coached in what they were to say or had agreed among themselves, without any outside hints, or after such hints.
The whole household made it appear that they had always suspected me of desiring Falco's death in order that I might gain my freedom and enjoy his promised legacies; that I had enticed and wheedled him into leaving me in his will an absurdly large share of his property.
They were also unanimous in declaring that they had been unable to bring home to me the devising of the robbery of thetriclinium, but they had all felt certain from the first that I had arranged to have confederates of mine steal the table silver. They were equally consistent in asserting that they all believed that I had murdered Falco, after arranging for the looting of the gem-collection as a blind.
Hour after hour I had to stand and watch wretch after wretch held to the glowing coals, had to listen to the shrieks of the victims, could not but realize that Ravillanus was bent on my conviction, that nothing would swerve him from his purpose.
Dromo, alone of all the household, alone of my obsequious, indulged personal servants, held out against the torture and though he writhed, yelled, sobbed and even endured the pain until he fainted more than once, refused to say anything against me.
After Dromo my turn came. When I was stripped Ravillanus rubbed his hands and remarked:
"You have your character written on your back! How could Falco trust a fellow so branded and scarred! Easy-going masters like Falco not only bring on their own deaths, but sap the foundations of safety for all slave-owners. Your back, in advance, advertises you guilty. Better own up."
I pass over the details. But I must confess that I was far from heroic. Perhaps it is true, and not an invention, that Marcus Scaevola voluntarily thrust his hand into the altar-fire and stood mute and smiling, and watched it burn and char. If any man ever did that he had more self- control than I ever had. I could repress every indication of my agonies. I fainted so many times that I lost count. The afternoon was drawing on towards evening before Ravillanus began to lose patience.
Tanno and Galen had been from the first among those about the tribunal. Now, in a pause, while I was being brought back to consciousness to be again tortured, Galen succeeded in gaining the attention of Ravillanus enough to induce him, though grudgingly, to permit the celebrated advocate, Memmius Tuditanus, whom they had brought with them, to speak in my behalf. I had regained consciousness before he began to speak and heard most of what he said. He spoke well.
His chief point was that a gem-expert and art-amateur like me, knowing that he was to inherit one of the finest and most carefully chosen collections of gems and art objects in all the world, would be the last man on earth to allow it to be disturbed, let alone to plot its ransacking, the pillage of its cases and the dispersal of their precious contents. No man could better have exposed the absurdity of the whole flimsy and preposterous fabrication that I had had two confederates, who had, in my interest and at my suggestion, robbed first thetricliniumand then the gem-collection, after which last I had myself murdered Falco.
But his logic, his lucidity and his eloquence fell on deaf ears. Ravillanus was unmoved. He permitted Lustralis to make a rambling and incoherent harangue, setting forth his ridiculous contentions.
Then he passed judgment:
"I hold you all innocent save Phorbas alone. Dromo is manifestly devoted to Phorbas and has lied in his behalf. But Dromo, apparently, was no accomplice in the plot or in the murder. I acquit him with the rest. Phorbas, who vilely plotted against his master, who foully murdered him, I adjudge guilty of his death and I hereby condemn him to be kept chained in the slaves' prison until the next day of beast-fighting in the Colosseum, then, in the arena, to be exposed to the ferocity of the famished wild beasts of the desert, wilderness and forest, by them to be lacerated and torn to pieces, as he richly deserves."
Tanno and Galen could indicate their grief and sympathy only by looks and gestures, for they dared not attempt to approach me.
Then Ravillanus called:
"Where is that barber?"
The apparitor who had gone off before the trial began produced a barber.
"Trim his hair and beard!" Ravillanus ordered. And I had to submit to having my long locks shorn and my beard clipped close, leaving me far too like my true former self for my comfort, since I still had hopes of Agathemer catching the real murderers in time to save me from the doom impending over me because of the fanaticism of Ravillanus, while I anticipated nothing but inescapable death should I be recognized as not Phorbas, but as Andivius Hedulio.
I was then, late in the afternoon of the Kalends of July, haled off to the Colosseum and immured in one of the cells of the lowermost crypt, far below the street level. To my amazement I found myself sharing the cell with Narcissus, who had been similarly condemned to exposure to the beasts, as the murderer of Commodus.
Together we spent five dreadful days in the darkness, dampness, chill and foulness of that tiny cell. I found that influence such as Tanno and Vedia possessed and cash such as they had at their disposal, could do much even for the occupant of such a cell, destined to such a doom. I was visited by Galen, more than once, and he emphasized the still hopeful possibility, nay probability, that Agathemer might, in time, save me, run down and bring before a magistrate the real murderers. I was gloomy, I admit. But his presence in that horrible hole and his words cheered me, by brightening the hope I had never wholly lost.
Also I was tended, massaged, rubbed, chafed, washed each day in warm water brought in big pails and poured into a big, shallow pan; I was anointed; clothed in a comfortable tunic, strengthened with plenty of good food and strong wine and provided with a cot and bedding and blankets. I was able to have Narcissus indulged also, in order that he might be a less unpleasant cell-mate.
He talked to me freely of life in the Palace, of Commodus, of Marcia, of Ducconius Furfur, of his own fatal mistake, of the amazing likeness, even apparent identity, between Furfur and Commodus, of the naturalness of his inability to tell them apart.
I drank and ate all the food and wine I could swallow, slept all I could, and tried to be hopeful.
Thus passed five horrible days and six hideous nights.
After no more than twelve days, as I learned later, Severus felt himself securely established as Prince of the Republic. By spending almost every moment of daylight on official business, denying himself more than the merest minimum of sleep and food, he had put every department of the government sufficiently in order to feel assured of their smooth and effective operation. His troops were now all outside the City, comfortably camped, well supplied and content; the City was orderly and its life had resumed its normal aspect and activities. He felt free to win the regard of the populace by magnificent exhibitions in the amphitheater, on the occasion of the eight days of the Games of Apollo, beginning the day before the Nones of July.
Early next day Narcissus and I were haled from our cell and led, by passages only too well known to me since my service in the Choragium, to the iron-gated doorway from which condemned criminals were thrust out into the arena for the lions or other beasts to tear. From inside that doorway I could look across the sand of the arena and could see not only the herald on his tiny platform, elevated above the leap of the most agile panther, not only the arena-wall opposite me, but also the faces of the senators in their private boxes on thepodium, even a portion of the nobility behind them and of the populace higher up and further back.
The day was hot, still and clear, and the July sunshine, still slant in the early morning, struck under the awning and long shafts of the mellow radiance brightened the sand.
From that doorway, craning over the heads of the wretches in front of me, I caught glimpses of the fury of several beasts as they vented their ferocity upon some ordinary criminals and assuaged their ravenous hunger on their blood and flesh.
My time was not far off, yet I still hoped against hope that Agathemer might, even yet, have caught the thieving murderers and would intervene before it was too late. I did not at all fear the beasts; I knew that no bear, panther, leopard, tiger or lion would hurt me, but I felt certain that, when the beasts left me unharmed, I should be recognized as Festus the Beast-Wizard: and then, as the scrutiny of the whole audience would be riveted on me, identified as Andivius Hedulio.
Narcissus was led out, stepping jauntily between his guards, treading springily, with no sign of panic or dejection, a pattern Hercules, naked save for a loin-cloth, his skin pink and fresh, in spite of his days in a dungeon, his mighty muscles rippling all over his huge form. The herald proclaimed to all that this was Narcissus, professional wrestler, for long the crony of Commodus, who had strangled his master and was to be punished for his treachery and crime by being torn to pieces in sight of all Rome.
They let out on him a full-grown, young Mauretanian lion, starved and ravenous. Narcissus was naked and empty-handed, his close-clipped hair, standing like the bristles of a brush, yellow as gold wire, shining in the sun. He stood almost as immobile as had Palus and faced the lion, which, after a bound or two towards him, flattened down on the sand and began to crawl nearer, preparing for a spring.
When it sprang Narcissus performed one of the most miraculous feats ever beheld in the amphitheater. He did not dodge but ducked slightly, the wide-spread, taloned paws missing his head on each side. His arms shot out as the lion sprang, and, though the brute came at him through the air like a log-arrow from a catapult, his hands gripped each side of the wide-open mouth and his thumbs pushed the inner corners of the lips between the parted upper and lower cheek-teeth. Therefore to close his jaws on his victim the lion had to crush a roll or fold of his own lips. This incredibly difficult feat prolonged his life a few breaths. The whole populace howled in ecstasy at the wretch's coolness, courage, strength, swiftness and adroitness.
The lion's momentum and weight bore Narcissus to the ground, but his thumbs did not slip nor his hold loosen. On the sand lion and man rolled and wrestled, for a brief time. Then the lion, lashing out with his hind legs, caught with the claws of one the wrestler's belly and half disemboweled him. Narcissus collapsed and the great fangs met in his throat.
The populace redoubled their yells.
When silence fell, after the lion had been chased back into his cage and the cage lowered down the lift-shaft, after the mangled corpse of Narcissus had been dragged away and sand sprinkled to hide the red patches where his blood had soaked it, I was haled forth and stood in the very center of the arena. From his perch the herald proclaimed that I was Phorbas, the slave of Pompeianus Falco of Carthage and Rome, who had plotted his master's death in order sooner to gain freedom from his testament, and had himself dealt Falco his deathblow. The populace jeered and booed at me.
I had, as Festus the Animal-Tender, often viewed the interior of the Colosseum from the arena. But never when I was myself the cynosure of all eyes. There I stood, naked except for a loin-cloth, empty-handed, my shoulder-brand and scarred back visible to half the spectators, glared at and reviled. From my viewpoint the spectacle was singularly magnificent: the dark blue sky overhead, varied by some large, solid-looking, white clouds; the fluttering banners waving from the awning poles; the particolored, sagging awning, shading half the audience; the beauty of the upper colonnade under the awning; the solidly packed throng of spectators which crowded the colonnade, the aisles, the steps and every seat in the hollow of the amphitheater; the dignified ease of the nobility in their spaced chairs, of the senators in their ample armchairs; the gorgeousness of the Imperial Pavilion, filled with a retinue brilliant in blue and silver, in green and gold, in white and crimson, about the hard, spare, soldierly figure on the throne.
I was the only human being on the sand, eyed by all onlookers.
From a door in thepodium-wall a famished lion was loosed at me. He bounded towards me, roaring; but, three or four lengths from me he paused, stood still regarding me, circled about me and then turned his back on me and loped off to the arena-wall, along which he rounded the arena, apparently searching for a way out. The populace, at first mute with astonishment, voiced their amazement in yells of a notably different quality from those they had uttered while watching Narcissus.
Another lion behaved similarly, except that he, after inspecting me, merely walked in circles far out in the arena, ignoring me as if I were not there at all.
They loosed on me five more lions, four tigers, four leopards, four panthers and four bears, of the fierce Alpine breed. Some of these animals delighted the populace by attacking each other and affording entertainment by savage and ferocious fighting. But not one showed any disposition to attack me.
As beast after beast approached me, conned me and spared me, the upper tiers began to call:
"He is innocent."
"He is guiltless."
"The beasts know."
"He is not guilty."
"The gods declare him clean of guilt!" and other such cries.
Also they began to show signs of being restless and bored. Some yelled for another criminal.
A seventh lion was loosed at me. He paused like the others and eyed me; then he strolled up to me, snuffed at me, and rubbed his mane against my hip, emitting a rambling purr. I laid my hand on his mane.
Instantly, from all sides at once, rang out cries of,
"Festus!"
"Festus the Beast-Wizard!"
"He's no Phorbas, he's Festus come back!"
I was not far from the Imperial Pavilion and one of the retinue leaned over thepodium-coping and called to me. I walked towards him. When I was within earshot he called in Greek:
"The King commands that you lead the beasts back to their cages."
Elated and hoping for a reprieve, for vindication, for life, for rehabilitation, for Imperial favor, I led beast after beast back to its cage on a shaft-lift, or to a door in the wall. When the last one was caged an officer of the Imperial retinue, a frontiersman only lately come to Rome, stepped out of one of the postern doors, two arena-slaves with him. They led me to the center of the arena, trussed my hands behind me, bound my ankles and wrapped round my head an evil-smelling old quilt, probably taken from the cot of some arena-slave housed in some cell under the hollow of the amphitheater. Half suffocated by it, unable to shake it off, for they tied it fast, I stood there, blind, realizing that the Emperor still believed me guilty, was inexorable and meant me to be torn to pieces then and there; believing, as I did, that my immunity from attack was due to the effect of my gaze on the beasts I made mild.
Now you, who read, know that I was not devoured. But I had no shred of hope left. I thought that my end had come. I anticipated only the agony of great fangs rending my flesh.
I felt only the hot breath of a beast snuffing at my legs. Perhaps I fainted. Certainly my next sensation was of lying on the sand, with several unseen animals growling near me and one or more snuffing at my feet and legs.
The amphitheater was quiet, even hushed.
Then, suddenly, a lion uttered a full-throated, coughing roar, jagged and rumbling. When it died away a universal yell arose from the populace. I heard cries of:
"He is innocent!"
"Set him free!"
"We behold the justice of the gods!"
"This proves him guiltless!"
"Festus or Phorbas, he is not guilty!"
And other such exclamations.
Ridiculously, what passed through my mind, besides disgust at the foul odor of the quilt about my head, was the thought that, if I had known that ferocious beasts would avoid me even when they could not see my gaze, I should, on that unforgettable moonlit evening in Sabinum, have gone off home to my cottage, to Septima, and have missed my encounter with Vedia, and our night in her traveling coach.
Then I heard the voices of the animal-tenders essaying, with their long- handled tridents, to chase back into their cages the beasts loose about me.
Soon someone cut my ankle-thongs and the cords about the quilt, also my arm-thongs. The quilt was twitched from my face and I was assisted to my feet. The amphitheater was full of the yells of the populace, affirming my innocence and the manifest intervention of the gods in my behalf. I rolled my gaze around the audience and sought to interpret the demeanor of the Imperial retinue.
Then, as I gazed at the Emperor, too far off for me to make out his expression, the yells altered their quality.
I turned round.
I saw, running towards me across the sand, Agathemer!
Behind him was an official in the robes of a magistrate!
Behind him six more human shapes, four lictors convoying two bound prisoners.
Agathemer embraced me and I him.
"Saved," he breathed, "we've got 'em and most of the loot. Enough to convict 'em and clear you!"
As we loosed our embrace I looked at the approaching magistrate.
He was Flavius Clemens!
Before the shock of recognizing him had passed I forgot him entirely.
For I had recognized the two prisoners.
Though I had seen them but once and that by moonlight, and that eight years before, I recognized the two drunken robbers who had helped us to our couriers' equipment and sent us off galloping to Marseilles.
Indubitably they were Carex and Junco!
While still numb with amazement I felt upon me the cold gaze of Flavius Clemens. I looked him full in the face. He was no less astonished than I and I could read in his expression both amazement and suspicion. I was acutely aware that Ravillanus, by having my hair and beard clipped, had made me readily recognizable to anyone and everyone who had known me in the days of my prosperity. I was even more acutely aware of the keen intuition which every lover feels toward any actual or potential rival. I dreaded that Clemens not only recognized me for myself, but had a glimmering inkling as to why his suit of Vedia had twice failed. But he said nothing except:
"You are cleared of every imputation in connection with the murder ofPompeianus Falco. You are free to go where you please."
Agathemer took off his robe, and threw it around me and led me to a postern. In the vaulted corridor we were met by Tanno, who embraced me and congratulated me, and Galen, who also embraced me and felicitated me. Tanno said:
"Vedia kept up till Agathemer nabbed the criminals, then she fainted; but she declares the faint relieved her and that she is entirely herself."
In one of the cells under the hollow of the amphitheater I was given strong wine, all I wanted, and then washed with warm water already prepared for me, and afterwards thoroughly massaged. Then I was clad in garments of my own.
"I feel like myself," I remarked.
Just then Flavius Clemens entered, his expression entirely too intelligible for me. Looking me full in the eyes he said:
"You have been passing as an art-amateur of Greek ancestry, under the name of Phorbas, with the status of a slave. Before that you were among the helpers at the Choragium, held as a slave belonging to thefiscus, by the name of Festus. It seems to me that you are no Greek, nor of Greek blood, even to the smallest degree, I take you for a full-blooded Roman. I think I recognize you. Are you not Andivius Hedulio?"
"I am," I acknowledged.
He saluted me courteously and bade me a polite farewell, without any other word.
Tanno and Galen made no comment, nor did Agathemer. They assisted me out to Tanno's waiting litter. In it I was borne off to the lodgings which I had occupied eight days before, between my two trials. There I found a tempting meal ready for me and ate liberally. Then I was put to bed and at once fell into the deep sleep of utter exhaustion and slept through till long after daylight next day.
When I woke I found that Dromo himself was by my bedside, as well as Agathemer. They tended me, washed me, plied me with wine and fed me with dainties, asserting that Galen had given orders that I was on no account to stir from my bed or sit up in it.
I slept again and, when I woke early in the afternoon, insisted on getting up and being dressed. I was no sooner clad than there entered the apartment a big, florid, youthful Pannonian sergeant and four legionaries.
I was yet again rearrested!
They led me away, forbidding Agathemer to exchange a word with me, or to follow us. Through the brilliant July sunlight they led me, along its northeast flank, up the Steps of Groaning, and to the Mamertine Prison!
There I was handed over to four of the assistants to the Public Executioner. They stripped me of my outer garments, leaving me naked except for my tunic. Then they haled me to the trap-door, lifted the trap, passed ropes under my armpits and lowered me into the dreaded lower dungeon, the horrible Tullianum!
Gloomy as is the upper cell of the Mamertine Prison there is light enough there for my eyes to have been utterly blinded by it as I was lowered into the black pit beneath. I saw nothing in the brief period while I was being let down, while the ropes were being drawn up, while the trap-door was shut down and fitted into place. Then I was in the pitchest darkness, into which no ray, no glimmer of light could penetrate. I saw nothing whatever, yet I seemed to feel a presence, seemed to hear a faint footfall, seemed to be aware of another human being standing close to me. Then I heard a deep, resonant, healthy, pleasant-sounding voice ask:
"Brother in misfortune, who are you?"
I was past any impulse towards dissimulation or any belief in its utility.
"I am Andivius Hedulio."
"You are?" the big, cheerful male voice exclaimed. "You really are? You amaze me! I am Galvius Crispinillus, lately and for many a year King of the Highwaymen! Give me your hand!"
Now, whatever distaste I felt for giving my hand to such a criminal, however great was my repugnance, however utterly I felt myself lost, however certain I was of the inevitable doom hanging over me, however short a respite I anticipated before my inescapable death, I was not fool enough to antagonize my companion in misery, presumably a powerful and ferocious brute. I held out my hand. His grasped it. Mine returned the grip.
"Come this way!" he said. "This pit is damp and chilly, but even here a bed of stale straw is better than the rock floor or the patches of mud on it or the heaps of filth. I know every inch of this hole and I know the least uncomfortable place to sit. Come along!"
He guided me in the utter blackness to a pile of damp straw. On it we sat down, half reclining.
"If you are thirsty," he said, "I can guide you to the well. There is a spring in here and plenty of good water."
"I thank you," I said. "I shall be thirsty enough before long. Just now I am far more interested to hear how you came here. Nobody believed that you would ever be caught."
"No more did I!" he ejaculated. "I had so easily defied the utmost efforts of the government and officials under Aurelius, of the incompetents under Commodus, of his vaunted Highway Constabulary; had so prospered, had so come and gone as I pleased and robbed whom I pleased from the Po to the Straits, that I thought no man could lay for me any snare I could not foresee, thought myself impeccably wary and prescient, though I had always taken and would always take all necessary precautions.
"But I was a fool. I comprehended Aurelius and Commodus and their magistrates and officials and constabulary; I was right in fearing nothing from Pertinax and Julianus; but I was an ass to think I could cope with Septimius Severus. That man is deeper than the deepest abyss of mid-ocean!
"I thought I was certain of months of disorder, confusion and laxity in which I could go where I pleased, act as I pleased, garner a rich harvest and escape unscathed. Do you know, before he had left Aquileia, perhaps before he had passed the Alps, possibly before he had set out from Sabaria, that man had despatched not one but a dozen detachments to ascertain my whereabouts, consider how best to take me unawares, lie in wait for me, nab me and hunt down my bands. I believe he had thought out, far back in that head of his, long before Pertinax was murdered, perhaps even long before Commodus died, every measure he would initiate if he became Emperor, down to the smallest detail. He had all his plans framed and thought out, I'll wager!
"His emissaries were no fools! They, first among those despatched against me, knew their business. I was trapped near Sentinum, on the Kalends of this month. Never mind how; even in this plight I'm ashamed of it. They just missed nabbing Felix Bulla along with me. But he got away that time. And I prophesy that now he is warned of his danger and knows the cleverness of the men on his trail, he'll show himself yet cleverer. He is a marvel, is Felix Bulla, and promises to outdo even my record."
He broke off, breathing audibly.
"By the way," he went on, "are you hungry? I have part of a loaf of bread in here, not yet stale and no damper than it must get in this foul air. It hasn't fallen on the floor. It's eatable."
"I'll be hungry enough before long," I replied, "but I am not hungry now.I had eaten all I wanted and of the best just before I was haled here."
"Speak when you want any," he said. "It will be share and share alike here for us till they come to finish us.
"And now, tell me about yourself. I have always been curious about you. I heard all about you when you first got into trouble and I was told that the official report of your death was fictitious, invented by underlings too clumsy to capture you and fearful of the consequences of their incompetence. Also I heard unimpeachable testimony that you were alive later and had been seen in Rome with Maternus and outside Rome, the next summer, with the mutineers from Britain. I have often wondered how you got into such company. Tell me how you came to be with Maternus."
I saw no utility in any further dissimulation of anything or in any reticence; I began with our springtime stay at the farm in the mountains, and told my story in detail, from that hour.
When I came to my visit, along with Maternus, to the Temple of Mercury and mentioned how Maternus had warned me that we were being watched, and how I had shot one glance towards the watchers and had recognized one of them, he interrupted me and, without enquiring where I had seen him before, asked for a description of the watcher I had recognized. I gave it as well as I could and he said:
"That was my brother, Marcus Galvius Crispinillus, now dead. It was he who told me that he had seen you with Maternus. Go on."
Again, when I spoke of recognizing Crispinillus by the wayside as I passed with the mutineers he interjected:
"Yes, he told me he saw you there."
And later, when I spoke of being found with Agathemer after the massacre, separated from him and led off to theergastulumat Nuceria he remarked:
"I can't conceive how my brother missed you. Nor could he. He looked for you among the corpses and went over the survivors twice in search of you."
"I did not see him after the massacre," I declared.
"Mercury protected you," was his comment.
When I finished the story of my giving warning of the plot in theergastulumat Nuceria I paused.
"Go on, lad!" he urged. "You have had adventures and you narrate them tellingly."
I hesitated and then, utterly reckless, I blurted out:
"If I am to go on with my story you might as well know right now, that I am not only Andivius Hedulio, but also Felix the Horse-Wrangler."
He swore a great oath.
"Boy!" he cried, "I love you! I have admired you since I listened to Bulla's account of his one failure. At first I was furious at your having spoiled the best plan I ever laid and the most brilliant chance I ever had, at your preventing me from making the biggest haul of booty I ever had hopes of. But, as years passed, my resentment has abated and my admiration has warmed. I bear you no grudge. I have often thought I should like to meet you and find out why on earth you desired to thwart me and how you managed to do it. Go on! Tell me the rest."
I resumed my tale.
When I came to my outlook from the crag and explained my former acquaintance with Vedia he interrupted.
"Of course, if you knew the lady and she was an old flame of yours, I don't wonder that you intervened to save her. My lads were so rough and fierce-looking that they had a worse reputation than they deserved. When they captured prisoners rich enough to pay any profitable ransom they treated them with the most scrupulous deference. Business is business and we were not brigands for fun, but for profit. Also they all dreaded me and my orders were explicit and emphatic. Your sweetheart would have been as respected with them as in her own home. But, of course, you couldn't feel that way. Go on with your story."
I demurred, asserting that I felt sleepy. He assented and we composed ourselves on the straw. How long I slept or when I wakened I do not know: I was roused by the opening of the trap-door and by the light which entered from above. Food was lowered to us; pork-stew, still warm, in a two-handled, wide-mouthed jug; bread; olives, not wholly spoiled; and a small kidskin of thin, sour wine. Galvius received the dole and safeguarded the containers: the ropes were drawn up, the trap-door reset and we were again in utter darkness.
To my astonishment I felt entirely myself and very hungry. We drank and ate deliberately and again drank. Galvius was a careful husbander of the wine, and we drank mostly water from the spring.
Afterwards, nestled in the not unendurably damp straw, chilly, but not shivering, we sat or lay side by side and he urged me to continue my story. I began where I had left off, and, going into the smallest details, brought my history down to the hour of my consignment to our dungeon.
When I paused he sighed, but not gloomily.
"You have had marvellous adventures," he said, "and marvellous luck, both good and bad. I knew that Marcia had belonged to your uncle. I was informed of the existence of Ducconius Furfur, of his likeness to Commodus, of his presence in the Palace, of his utilization as a dummy Emperor, to set Commodus free to masquerade as Palus, and I heard that he had been your neighbor.
"Now go back, begin your tale at the beginning. Tell me of your getting into trouble at the first, of how you escaped in the first place. I have often wondered how you managed it."
"Give me a respite," I demurred, "my voice is tired. It is your turn to talk. Tell me how you learned about Ducconius Furfur and about Commodus masquerading as Palus and about Marcia."
"Why," he said, "I had friends in one or more towns when I first took to the woods. They gave me tips that helped me to make fine hauls on the highways. As I prospered I made more friends; they helped me and my growing success gained more, till I had friends in every town in Italy and in Rome itself and an organized service of road-messengers. Why, Imperial couriers often carried letters and packets, destined for me, from one town to another, or even carried onward letters from me to distant friends or parcels of my booty.
"In Rome itself I had many agents and chiefly my sister, Galvia Crispinilla, a professional procuress and poisoner, who knew the worst secrets of the lives of all Rome's wealthy and noble debauchees, and our brother, Marcus Galvius Crispinillus, a professional informer and a valued member of the Imperial Secret Service. I never knew why he had a spite against you, but he had and it was false information given by him that caused your proscription and ruin and thrust you into your years of misery. I always felt that you did not deserve what you have suffered, but his grudges were none of my business.
"He is dead, as is Galvia, for she kept poison about her and gave a supply to him and to me to use in case of capture. I was caught without mine, for I was certain that no danger threatened me. He and she took the poison when they saw capture inevitable, as it will be for most evil-doers all over the Empire under the sway of such a man as Septimius Severus."
He paused and I meditated awhile, puzzling as to how I could have incurred the vindictive rancor of any secret-service agent.