Chapter II: Introduction (2)

"The troops are eager to be led out; the enemy insult us up to the very ditch. Italy is wasted," went on Minucius; but, as if slightly cowed by the deep, gray eyes, his tone seemed less aggressive.

Fabius paused a moment, before answering, and glanced around upon the lowering faces of legates and tribunes. Then he said:--

"It is proper, Quirites, that I should say something to you of my plans. Our men are new--untried. Those that have seen service have seen defeat. The enemy are flushed with victory, full of confidence in themselves and their general, well seasoned in battle. Has the Republic a new army if this be lost? But happily there is another side to the picture. We are in our own lands. Our supplies are inexhaustible; _we_ receive; _they_ must take. We shall wear them out in skirmishes, cut off their foragers--men whom they cannot replace, while we replace our losses daily and season ourselves in battle and grow to see that even Carthaginians are not immortal."

There was a moment of silence. Then Minucius spoke again.

"And, while we pursue this prudent policy, what becomes of the spirit of our men who see that their general dares not face the enemy? What becomes of the allies who see their fields wasted and cities burned, while Rome lies silent in her camps and offers no succour?"

Fabius' brow clouded, but he spoke even more mildly than before.

"There is much of truth in what you say Marcus; but I am convinced that there is less danger in such risks than in tempting the fate of Flaminius; and there are many compensations, together with certain victory in the end."

And then the master-of-the-horse lost control of his temper; his voice rose, and he cried out:--

"You are general and you command, but you shall hear me when I say that I had rather have perished bravely with a Flaminius than live to conquer in such cowardly fashion with a Fabius."

A murmur of half-uttered applause ran around the circle, but Fabius did not seem to hear it. He eyed his lieutenant calmly for an instant. Then he said:--

"You speak truth, Marcus, when you say that I am general;" and, turning his back upon Minucius, he passed through the line of officers, as they fell aside to give him way, and proceeded slowly toward the praetorian gate.

Here, among the soldiers, discontent with the dictator's policy was as strong as it had been in the praetorium, while its expression was less governed by the amenities of rank. Roman discipline, however severe as to the acts of the legionary, put very few restrictions upon his speech; and the general, as he watched from the rampart the lines and movements of the enemy, heard many comments no less uncomplimentary than those of his master-of-the-horse, and couched in language almost as coarse as that of the Numidians themselves. It seemed as if the foul words of the barbarians were passed on thus to the man held responsible for Romans being compelled to listen to such insults.

Curiously enough, the centurions and under officers appeared to be the only ones not hostile to Fabius' policy. These were silent or even made some efforts to restrain the ribaldry of their men.

As for the general himself, no one could have appeared less conscious of the storm his orders had provoked. His eyes were still fixed upon the distant array, and when, as the sun almost touched the meridian, Lucius Sergius approached with despatches just arrived from Rome, he was compelled to speak twice before the other was aware of his presence. Then the dictator turned quickly, and, pointing to the Carthaginians, exclaimed:--

"See! they are withdrawing. Do you not note how thin the centre grows? Ah! I shall teach them new lessons of war--new lessons. They will find in me no Flaminius, to let my enemy choose the day and field of battle."

Leaving the ramparts, they walked back toward the praetorium, Fabius breaking the seals and reading the letters as he walked. When they reached the tent, he stood still for a moment and seemed to study the face of the young tribune who had followed, a half pace behind, to receive any answer or order that might be forthcoming.

"What is your opinion of my refusing battle?" he asked suddenly, after a short silence.

Sergius turned crimson, but he answered quickly:--

"I have learned to trust in my general until such time as I know him to be unworthy of trust."

Fabius smiled.

"Some of your colleagues appear to have already arrived at the latter conclusion," he said. Then, after a pause, he went on: "After all, it is the judgment of the centurions that counts for most. Our legates and tribunes feel disgraced by our refusing a challenge; they may be sneered at for _that_, but who would blame _them_ for the defeat that might follow its acceptance. The common soldier knows only his rage against the enemy, sees his comrades about him furious for battle, and comprehends nothing of its dangers. It is the centurions, our veterans, who realize the truth: the worth of their own men as measured against those of the enemy; nor are they puffed up with foolish pride of rank. You observe, sir, that the centurions are with me."

Sergius bowed.

"Now mark well what will happen," pursued Fabius. "Hannibal will retreat to his camp; he will break camp and march off during the night. He must have forage, and he cannot scatter his forces while I am near. He will escape, and I shall let him, rather than risk the army in a night battle; but I shall hang close as the father-wolf to the stag's haunch, keeping nevertheless to the high ground, where his cavalry cannot trouble me. There will be need of good horsemen who shall cling yet closer and advise me of his movements."

Sergius' eyes flashed with eagerness, but he said nothing.

"You will attend to this service," continued Fabius, not seeming to regard the young officer's exultation. "Take the other five turmae of your legion--not those of the escort. You must have light cavalry to cope with the Numidians, and your Greek horsemen are too heavily equipped. Assemble your men, watch the enemy, follow him when he marches tonight, cut off his stragglers, and send such words to me as you consider necessary. This shall be your reward for trusting greater things to your general."

Turning, he entered the tent, before the tribune could express his thanks.

Deeply impressed by the favour and confidence of the dictator, Sergius hurried away to his quarters, and, sending for Marcus Decius, the decurion who had told the news of Trasimenus to the crowd of the Forum, he directed him to see that the horses were fed and the men in readiness for a night march. Then he resigned himself to sleep and dreams of a certain pictured peristyle on the Palatine Hill,--a peristyle wherein a maid sat spinning by a fountain and thinking--of what? Perhaps of him--for he was only dreaming, and maidens do not always think as men dream.

V.

TEMPTATION.

The night was already far spent, and the Roman camp slept on, secure in all its grim array; silent, but for the tread of the patrols, as they paced the streets and exchanged the watchword, post with post, or but for the clang of sword upon greave, or shield against cuirass, as some sentry at gate, rampart or praetorium shifted his arms in weary waiting for the day.

Far up in the heavens the moon shone silvery and serene, while here and there upon the plain below swaying points of light seemed to move, flicker, go out, and rekindle again. No Roman watcher but knew well that play of moonlight upon the heads of the reedlike spears with which the ancient cavalry of the legion were equipped--weapons which, together with their ox-hide bucklers, were being gradually superseded by the heavier Greek accoutrements. Yes, and had not the word passed from the guard at the praetorian gate, how a tribune and five turmae of the fourth legion had ridden out on the service of the dictator?

Earlier in the night, those who listened closely had heard a low hum that seemed to pervade the air, rising and falling like the dull glow in the west that told of the fluctuant watch-fires of the hostile camp. Now the noises had died away, as in the distance, and the light that had flashed up a few hours since hardly tinted the clouds. It is only the old soldier who can read the signs of a decamping foe, who knows how the fagots must be heaped at the moment of departure, so that the deserted fires may burn until the morning, whose quick ear catches and recognizes the indefinite noises of a host moving in secret. All these things were, and old campaigners among the legionaries at the gate had read them aright. Messenger after messenger hurried to the praetorium, and returned with word that the dictator slept, "having taken all needed measures," and how the master-of-the-horse paced up and down before his tent, grinding his teeth, clenching his hands, and muttering curses upon patrician cowardice and imbecility.

Meanwhile, Lucius Sergius rode on through the night, with Marcus Decius at his side, and the troop of horse trailing out across the plain behind them.

"It is silent, master," said the decurion, but his attitude, as he leaned forward over his horse's neck, was rather of one trying to smell than to listen. "The pulse-eaters sleep deeply." He watched Sergius from under half-closed lids, waiting to be contradicted, that he might measure his officer's warcraft.

Sergius smiled. "Perhaps they are even wider awake than ourselves," he said, drawing rein. Then, as the other nodded several times in satisfied acquiescence, he brought his horse to his haunches a stride beyond, and added: "It was the dictator who said we should find their lair empty, and, though I do not question his judgment, it will be well to send on a few who shall spy out the fact, and see whether there be not Numidians lurking among the huts."

So, slowly and cautiously, they pushed forward again, with riders in advance, until a shout gave notice that the way was indeed clear, and they rode through the open gate of the rampart and along the silent street of the deserted camp.

Nothing was about them save dismantled huts, for the most part mere burrows with roofs of interlaced boughs that were now smoking amid the ashes of the fires. Not a sign of disorder, nor even of the rapidity with which so great an army had been moved; not a scale of armour left behind--only the insufferable stench of a barbarian camp, of offal and refuse piled or scattered about, of dead beasts and of dead men--the sick and wounded who had yielded to sword or disease during the last few days.

It was with a sense of relief that the cavalcade emerged from the shadows of the huts and began to mount the rising ground beyond. The moon, too, had grown faint, and the gray mists of the morning were lying along the lower levels. Sounds, mingled and far ahead, told of the presence of a marching host, and Sergius led his troop on a more oblique course to gain the flank of the foe and lessen the chances of detection and ambuscade.

It was not stirring work for a soldier--the days that followed; never attacking, always guarding against discovery and surprise, viewing slaughter and devastation that duty and weakness alike made him powerless to prevent or punish, sending courier after courier to his general to tell of the enemies' march or of stragglers and foragers to be crushed in the jaws of the army that enveloped the invader's rear. Thus the war passed through Apulia, over the Apennines, down into the old Samnite lands, past Beneventum that closed its gates and mourned over its devastated fields, on across the Volturnus, descending at last into the Falernian plain, the glory of Campania, the Paradise of Italian wealth and luxury.

During all these days Sergius had grown thinner and browner. Little furrows had been ploughed between the eyes that must pierce every ridge and thicket for the glint of javelins and the wild faces of the bridleless riders of the desert. From time to time news of devastators cut to pieces brought a fierce joy to his heart; from time to time he dreamt he saw the eagles of the Republic hovering upon the heights above, ready to stoop and strike and save the allied lands from trials greater than they could bear; but of Marcia, scarce a waking thought. Surely the man he now was had never reclined in peaceful halls where women plied the distaff and talked about love, and of how Rabuleius, the perfume-maker of the Suburra, had just received a new essence from Arabia! That old life was all a dream, perhaps the memory of a former existence, as the sage of Croton had taught. There was nothing real in the world, in these days, but fear and suffering and humiliation and revenge. Even duty had become a mere habit that should minister to greater influences.

And now it was worst of all. Campania was a conflagration from which rose supplications and shrieks and groans, mingled with curses against the cowardly ally that had left her to her fate. Still the legions held to the high ground, and still the black pest of Numidia swept hither and thither on its errand of murder and rapine. Even to Sergius the plans of the dictator began to seem but "coined lead," as Marcus Decius roughly put it. Of what avail was it that the pass at Tarracina was blocked, that he had garrisoned Casilinum in the enemies' rear and Cales upon the Latin Way, and that the sea and the Volturnus and the steep hills with their guarded passes seemed to complete the line of circumvallation? Could such bonds hold one so wise as Hannibal from the rich cities of the plain? Unless Rome would advance her standards, were not Sinuessa and Cumae, Puteoli and Neapolis, Nuceria and Teanum, and, above all, Capua, left to fight their own battle against barbarian insolence and barbarian power? What hope to starve out an enemy established in such a region and amid such affluence!

Then, too, there was less work now for Sergius, even such as it was. The enemy, wheresoever he marched, was well in view from a dozen points held by the dictator, and at last word came to the tribune that he should join the camp near Casilinum. There, at least, he would have companionship in shame, instead of seeming to command men and being unwilling to lead them to fight for lands which the gods themselves had deemed worthy of their contention.

They were near Cales when the orders were brought. Could it be the dictator's intention to give battle and avenge what he had failed to save? By midday they were mounted and threading the forest paths that led to their comrades--paths whence, from time to time, some vista in the woods disclosed the plain below, with here and there a column of smoke that made Sergius grind his teeth and clench his hands in impotent rage. Suddenly he drew rein, for a man, dressed in the coarse, gray tunic of a slave, had half run, half stumbled across his way. An instant more, and the fellow was struggling in the grasp of Decius, who had sprung to the ground.

"What now, forkbearer! what now, delight of the scourges!" cried the decurion. "Will you delay the march of a tribune of the Republic?"

"Pity me, master, pity me and let me go!" cried the man, still striving vainly to escape. "Surely they are close behind me--"

"Who are behind you?" asked Sergius, sternly. "Speak and lie not, food for Acheron!"

"They who are burning the farm."

Sergius' eyes glittered, and he leaned forward to catch the words, as he began to gather their import.

"Speak quickly, and you shall be safe," he said, in more reassuring tones. "Whose farm is it that is burning? Loose him, Marcus."

Released from the hands that held him, the fugitive seemed to waver for a moment between speech and flight. Perhaps exhaustion turned the balance, for, still panting for breath, he threw himself on his knees before Sergius' bridle and gasped:--

"My master's farm--a veteran of the first war--a centurion--the Numidians."

"Where is it? How many are there?"

The man pointed down the slope up which he had scrambled.

"I did not note their numbers, lord. Perhaps a hundred--perhaps more."

As he spoke, the sky began to brighten as with fire, and Sergius, wheeling his horse, urged him downward toward the plain. Decius was by his side in an instant, and behind them came the cavalry at a speed that threatened to hurl them headlong to the foot of the rocky declivity. Joy and fury shone on the faces of the men: only Marcus Decius seemed troubled and abstracted.

"We shall be with them soon, my Marcus," cried Sergius, gayly, and then, noting the furrowed face of his first decurion: "Surely, Trasimenus has not cooled your heart. Take courage. There is no water here to chill you."

Decius flushed through the deep bronze of his skin.

"It is true that there is no water here, and blows might warm my blood. It was the command of the dictator that I thought of."

They had reached the level plain now. A cluster of burning buildings hardly a mile ahead marked their goal.

"And it is you, Marcus, who have been railing at those same commands?"

"I am an old soldier, my master. I growl, but I obey."

For answer, Sergius urged on his horse with knee and thong. Now they could distinguish dark shapes gliding hither and thither around the fires, and now they burst in upon a scene as of the orgies of demons.

Utterly unsuspicious of danger, the marauders had taken no precautions. Their wiry, little horses had been turned loose about the gardens, while the riders murdered and pillaged and ravished and destroyed. The worst was over now. Little remained of the buildings, save clay walls covered with plaster; dead bodies were scattered here and there; the women and such of the slaves as had not been slaughtered, together with the farm stock and other things of value, were gathered beyond the reach of the fires; while, bound high upon a rude cross before his own threshold, the master of the farm writhed amid flames that shot upward to lick his hands and face.

Then, in an instant, the scene was changed: the Roman horsemen burst in, and, frenzied by the spectacle before them, slew madly and fast. Hither and thither they swept, wherever the dusky figures sought to fly, and the thin, reed-like lances rose and plunged and rose again, shivering and dripping, from the bodies of their victims. But for their well-trained steeds, who came and knelt at their masters' calls, not one of the desert horsemen could have escaped, and, as it was, a mere dozen broke out from the carnage and scurried away, with the avengers in close and relentless pursuit. Marcus Decius paused a moment before the cross and studied the torn frame and blackened skin of the man who hung there. Then, with a swift movement of his lance, he transfixed the quivering body, and, hardly catching the "Jove bless thee, comrade," and the sigh with which life escaped, he dashed on after the pursuing squadrons.

VI.

DISOBEDIENCE.

That the chase was doomed to be a vain one seemed apparent. Once mounted and urging on their steeds with the shrill, barbaric cries of the desert, Hannibal's light horsemen were safe from all ordinary pursuit. One after another of the Romans drew up his panting animal, and scarce half of their turmae pounded on.

Suddenly they saw the flying Numidians throw their horses upon their haunches. A moment of indecision followed, and then, while several darted off obliquely, the remainder, seven or eight in all, swung around and charged straight at the legionaries. At their head rode a giant, black as ebony save where gouts of red had splashed him with the hue of terror. His frizzly hair was caught up high and ornamented with a cluster of ostrich feathers, while with his right hand he drew javelin after javelin from the sheaf he carried in his left, and launched them with unerring aim at his former pursuers. Three had flown on their errands, two had brought down a soldier each, and the third quivered in the throat of Sergius' horse. Then, as the animal reared and went over, carrying his rider with him, the assailant burst through the line, and in a moment had gained the open plain beyond. Once more he was safe, safe but for one short, thick-set rider,--Marcus Decius, first decurion of the first turma, hastening to overtake his troop.

Escape from such a pursuer was child's play for the Numidian; but the fury of fight was on him, and, gnashing his white teeth, from which the thick, black lips seemed to writhe away, he bent low amid his horse's mane and, with an inarticulate cry, urged him straight at the veteran. His javelins had all been expended in breaking through the Roman line, and a short, heavy dagger was his only weapon. Nothing daunted, he came on, evaded like a flash the thrust of Decius' spear, and hurled himself upon him. It was the small buckler of the Roman that saved his life; the dagger passed through the ox-hide, slightly gashing his arm, and, before the barbarian could withdraw it, the impact of the horses in full career had sent both men and animals to the plain in a floundering heap. Again the Numidian was quicker, and, gaining his feet, he sprang, weaponless as he was, upon the decurion still struggling to untangle himself from his fallen horse. The buckler, with the African's knife thrust through it, had rolled away, and the possession of Decius' sword, which hung in its sheath upon his right thigh, became the object of the struggle. Perhaps the strength of the men was not very unequal; but the Roman, hardly free from his mount, was undermost and wounded, so that the result seemed hardly doubtful. The Numidian's charger had risen to its feet, and stood, with out-stretched neck, whinnying softly, as if sharing in the excitement of the contest. Then the trampling of hoofs sounded in the ears of the straining combatants. Decius felt his adversary make a convulsive effort as if to free himself, and then a gush of something warm came into the Roman's face, and his foe sank down upon him, limp and helpless. With a last effort of his spent strength, he pushed the twitching body aside, and, staggering to his feet, saw Sergius standing beside him, with a dripping sword in his hand, and the bridle of Titus Icilius', the flag-bearer's, horse thrown over his left arm.

Remounting, they rode slowly back to their troop, and then the cause of the strange boldness of the fugitives was disclosed. Advancing across the plain directly in the path of their flight came four hundred of the allied cavalry, whom the dictator had sent out to reconnoitre, and, caught thus between two lines, the Numidians had, for the most part, chosen to take their chances against the weaker force. Not one of the marauders was alive, but they had sold their lives dearly; for a dozen of the Romans also were dead, and a score more showed wounds that marked this last spasm of barbarian frenzy.

While the men talked together, Sergius sought the praefect of the new detachment, a Hostilian of the family of Mancinus, whom he recalled among the young hot-heads that formed the party of the master-of-the-horse, and declaimed against the policy of Fabius as cowardly and base. He found him in the best possible humour, laughing and making coarse jests amid a circle of decurions and optios--as rude a Roman as marched with the standards, yet able, when occasion demanded, to play the man of fashion who had spent a year at Athens. The latter mood fell upon him when he descried Sergius. He came forward to meet him.

"Health to you, my Lucius!" he cried, "Surely the gods have held you in especial favour this day. I am told you have cut up a few squadrons of this African offal."

"With your timely aid," replied Sergius, bowing.

"I but made the hares double to your coursing," said Hostilius, carelessly; "and they tell me you have won both the spolia opima and a civic crown. That is a great deal for one day--and under a peaceful dictator."

Sergius flushed.

"I shall not claim them," he said. "Doubtless, Decius would have both slain the fellow and saved himself had I not come up--"

"No modesty! no modesty!" cried Hostilius, gayly. "I assure you it is even less Greek than Roman in these days. Lo! now, I myself will claim both for you at Rome, if only to show that I do not grudge you your share of the carrion. Perhaps such honours will not prejudice you in a certain house on the Palatine," he added, slyly. "But come! you and I shall join our forces and raid together. We have sent two hundred to Acheron since we left the camp, and birds have been singing on our left all the morning."

"Where is the dictator now?" asked Sergius.

"In his tent, of course," replied the other, scornfully. "And no one cares where that may be."

"And you?"

"Oh! he was persuaded at last to risk a scouting party, and, at the request of the brave Minucius, he gave the command to me with strict injunctions to use only my eyes. Well, I have used them so sharply that my hands, too, have been full," and Hostilius laughed. "There are some five hundred of the cross-food that have evaded me thus far. We shall catch them now, though, and, together, it will be easy for us to prevail."

Sergius was silent. To make a dash from the heights in defence of allies dying in his sight, was one thing; to deliberately join this insubordinate in turning a reconnaissance into a raid, was another and much more serious matter.

The praefect noted his hesitation, and a slight frown chased the smile from his lips.

"Or perhaps you prefer to obey the old woman's orders," he added, "and keep your couch warm. Well, our men and horses are fed by this time, and I am off. If you are a Roman, I greet you to ride with me; if you fear robbers or the axe that smote Titus Manlius, why, I will bid you farewell and ride alone."

"Where do you set your course?" queried Sergius, with a vague hope of at least seeming to combine inclination with duty.

"Toward the enemy," replied the other, shortly. "Does not the direction please you?" and he turned to his horse.

Sergius' brow clouded. His blood was hot with the conflict just finished. Youth, courage--all combined to turn him from obedience; but obedience bade fair to conquer, when Marcia's laugh rang in his ears, and he could hear her gravely complimenting his prudence and discoursing on the rare value of docility in a husband. Besides, what did it all matter? Had he not said that he sought death? and, surely, the way it came soonest was the best.

Placing his hand upon his horse's withers, he vaulted upon its back, before the animal had time to kneel, and a moment later was beside Hostilius.

"By Hercules!" exclaimed the latter; "I am glad you are here. Even in these days of strange things, I would have found it difficult to imagine that a Sergian could be a coward."

"And now," cried Sergius, "you will only have to imagine him a fool. So be it, and let the cost of his life pay for his folly."

"Jupiter avert the omen!" exclaimed Hostilius, shuddering, and then, turning to his trumpeter, he bade him give the signal for the march.

It was a desolate country--the fair plains of Campania through which they rode. Here and there a cluster of blackened ruins, here and there things that were once men, fruit trees cut down, vines uprooted, corn-fields reaped with the sword; while far away upon the horizon smoky columns curled up to show that the work of devastation still went on.

"May Mavers curse him--curse him forever!" cried Hostilius, grinding his teeth in rage at each new manifestation of the enemy's handiwork. "Could the most disastrous battle be worse than this?"

Sergius was silent. In a way his feelings went out to meet those of his companion; but the dictator had trusted him, and he had disobeyed, and, for all his disobedience, his soldier's instinct told him that the dictator was right.

Hostilius eyed him sharply and suspiciously, as if trying to divine his thoughts.

"If you regret--" he began.

Suddenly a decurion of the allies dashed up beside them.

"Look!" he cried, pointing toward the east. "There is carrion for the wolves."

Both leaders turned at the words.

Far out across the plain was what seemed at first sight like a clump of dark foliage, save that it moved and changed shape too much.

"Numidians!" exclaimed the decurion, following his finger with his speech, while the veins in Hostilius' forehead began to swell and grow dark.

"The signal! Let it be given," he cried to his officer, and, turning, he dug his knees into his horse's sides and galloped toward the distant quarry. A moment later the cavalry wheeled at the trumpet call, and, in some disorder but full of eagerness, began the pursuit of their leader.

As for Sergius, he, too, gave order and rein, though more deliberately, and his troop followed the cavalry of the allies in somewhat better array. By his side galloped Decius with an expression hard to analyze upon his weather-beaten face.

Sergius glanced at the old soldier from time to time with a look of inquiry and concern. At last he ventured to question his grim mentor.

"Is it well or ill, Marcus?"

"Ill for you that command, well for me who obey," growled the other, and Sergius flushed and was silent.

"Shall we catch them?" he asked, a few moments later, for the clump of Numidians, who had sat motionless upon their horses until the Romans covered half the intervening distance, had now wheeled for flight.

"If they be too strong for us, we shall catch them," replied Decius. "It is as they will."

And now it became apparent that the marauders were far inferior in numbers to the assailants, and that they recognized the fact; for flight and pursuit began in earnest. Horses were urged to higher speed. At one moment the Numidians seemed to be holding their distance; at another, the Romans gained slightly but unmistakably. All order of detachments and turmae was soon lost; Romans and allies, officers and men, were mingled together in a straggling mass, with naught but the eagerness of the riders and the speed of their animals to marshal them. Only Decius continued to pound along, with his horse's nose at his tribune's elbow. The thunder of many hundred hoofs rolled across the plain.

"By Hercules! we shall do it!" cried Sergius, in whom ardour of the chase had put to flight all sentiments of regret or doubt. "Do you not see we are gaining?"

"They ride silently yet," said Decius. "It is but knee-speed with them. Wait till they cry out to their horses, and we shall see."

Suddenly, as if to supplement the words, a single shrill cry, half whistle, half scream, rose up ahead. Had they been closer, they might have noted the pricking ears of the desert steeds; but this much they saw:--one horse and rider darting out of the press, like arrow from bow, and scurrying away over the plain as if their former gait had been but a hand-gallop.

An instant of misgiving came to some few of the Romans, who were not blind to everything but the excitement of the moment, but they, like the rest, only plied knee and thong the harder, and the episode of the single rider was forgotten by all save Marcus Decius and Sergius.

"It is a trap, master," said the former, with an inquiring glance at his leader.

Sergius bowed his head, and his face was troubled, as he replied:--

"I know it, my Marcus, but we cannot turn back now. I have accepted the feast: therefore I must recline until my host gives the signal to rise. I pray you pardon me."

By a quick movement Decius urged his horse a stride ahead of the tribune's, that he might the better hide his emotion; at the same time growling:--

"I pardon you?--and for the chance of a blow at the scum? I thank you many times."

And now, from the plain ahead rose a low range of rolling hills over which a light cloud seemed to hover. Was it the ascent that wearied the horses of the Numidians? Surely the space between pursuers and pursued was lessening rapidly, and Hostilius leaned far forward, shaking his spear and calling upon his men for a renewed effort.

"Now! now!" he cried. "See! they are spent! Up with them ere they top the hill!"

But the Numidians gained the sought-for ridge, if only by a few spear-lengths' lead, and the cloud, now close ahead, hung so dense that there were those who thought it the smoke of another farm. Decius' eyes seemed set in a dazed stare. There was too much red in that cloud, and yet it was not the red of fire, and it was too light and too thin for smoke. He knew it; he had known it all along, but what did it matter? The last Numidian had disappeared down the opposite slope--no! surely they had turned again, and in a longer line--a thicker one; and the light javelins and naked black bodies had become long, stout spears and glittering corselets, while at their head rode a slender man with forked beard, and his black eyes seemed to burn in his head like coals. So, with one barbaric roar, the whole array poured down over the allied cavalry, and these were like the dust of the trampled field.

VII.

PUNISHMENT.

Sergius hardly knew what was happening. He was conscious that the stride of his horse had been checked by a dense mass of plunging animals in front--a mass that grew more dense and more tangled with every instant. Those behind were still endeavouring to press forward, and those in front were hurled back upon them or were striving frantically to break through the rearmost squadrons and escape; while, shrill above the clash of arms and the shouts and screams, rose a name that Sergius found himself listening to with a sort of curious interest.

"Maharbal! Maharbal!" came the cry, nearer and nearer.

At the first moment of the check, Marcus Decius had pushed the sturdy horse that he rode well to the fore. He saw Hostilius riding back, waving one arm and crying out incoherent words: his spear was gone, and the head of a Spaniard's lance had been thrust through his shoulder and broken off, so that a third of the shaft hung from the wound.

Then what had happened and the hopelessness of it all became apparent. Like the veriest fools they had ridden into the snare, and Maharbal, the Carthaginian, with at least two thousand Spanish and African horsemen, was thundering on their front and flanks: their front--but in a moment, their rear; for now those who had not been ridden down at the first onset or become inextricably entangled with their fellows broke away over the plain, carrying their officers with them in a mad frenzy of flight; while other Numidians--fresh riders on fresh steeds--urged the pursuit and smote down the hindermost.

Decius found himself riding in the middle of the press. His face was as imperturbable as ever, though he glanced over his shoulder from time to time as if to note how much nearer death had come. Sergius galloped close behind him, careless and abstracted, his rein lying loose on his charger's steaming neck. Then, of a sudden, a resolve seemed to come to him. Straightening himself, he urged the weary horse forward through the fugitives till he drew up even with Hostilius, who, still frantic with panic, was now swaying in his saddle from the pain and loss of blood.

Sergius leaned over and laid his hand upon the other's arm, and Hostilius started as if he had touched a serpent. Then he became calmer, and a troubled look was in the eyes that sought the tribune's face.

"Yes, I know," he said at last, speaking hurriedly and in odd, strained accents. "I led you into it, and now I am flying."

"Let us turn back," said Sergius, mildly. "I do not reproach you, but let us turn back. Surely it is better than the rods and axe."

Hostilius shuddered, and, at that moment, Decius, who had overtaken them, broke in with:--

"By Hercules! there is no fear of those. They cut us down in flight. The choice is, shall we have it in the face or between the shoulders."

"By the gods of Rome, then!" shouted the praefect, suddenly reining up, while Sergius and Decius swung their horses in short circles.

There was no trumpet to give the signal, and the little cavalry banner had gone down long ago; but such was the force of Roman training that nearly all of Sergius' men and half of the allies turned in mid-panic with their leaders. To make head, much less to form was impossible, for the foremost of the enemy were well mingled with the rearmost fugitives. As Decius had said, it was only a choice of deaths: the one swift and honourable, the other more lingering, but none the less inevitable.

Almost in a moment it was over. Between two and three hundred of the united detachments had fallen already, and the hundred or so that now sought to face about, went down in a crushed and bleeding mass under the thousands of hoofs that overwhelmed them. Such was the weight and impetus of the pursuing force that there was no time even to strike, and most of the victims fell unwounded by spear or javelin. Sergius was vaguely conscious that he had seen the praefect cloven through the head by the short, swordlike Numidian knife, his own horse seemed to collapse under him, and that was the end.

Then he knew that it was dark and cold and that there was a howling in the air, as of beasts of prey, and the shadow of a man fell across him, for the moon was in the heavens, and the man was cursing by all the gods of the Capitol.

Gradually consciousness returned, and he recalled, incident by incident, the happenings of the past day. He had been lying still, thus far, without further wish than to look up at the stars and think and listen to what he now knew was the distant howling of wolves and the nearer curses of Marcus Decius. At last he stirred slightly, and the decurion turned and looked down.

"Do you live, master?"

"Yes, truly," replied Sergius; "unless you chance to be a shade."

Then he struggled to his feet, and the two gazed silently at each other and around them. All about, in the moonlight, lay the bodies of horses and men, the latter glittering in their white tunics, save here and there an officer whose helmet and breastplate had seemed to mark out his corpse for stripping and nameless desecrations. Sergius' head-piece was gone, but he glanced at his own corselet and then at Decius.

"We were buried together under a heap of dead," said the latter, in answer to the unasked query. "They made haste in their spoiling; and, when they had gone, I drew myself free and found you: the wolves are feasting well to-night; can you walk?"

Sergius moved stiffly a few steps. He felt bruised from head to foot, and one arm hung useless from a dislocated shoulder, but he found no wound. Decius had not escaped so lightly. Besides the gash he had received earlier in the day, he had been cut again across the forehead, but his prodigious strength seemed to have inexhaustible resources to draw upon.

"Come," he said. "We must go southward as quickly as possible. Sergius still walked slowly about, glancing at one corpse after another, until the decurion, at last divining his thought, broke in roughly:--

"Come! The wolves must provide him sepulchre as they will do for better men. What would he have? The she-wolf suckled the twins. Let Hostilius pay the debt by feeding the she-wolf's cubs. By Hercules! other sepulchre for him means need of one for ourselves."

So speaking, he at last drew Sergius away, and they began their weary tramp across the field.

"If I could have seen but one pulse-eater among the slain," said the tribune, after they had gone some distance in silence.

"I know of one that should be dead," remarked Decius, grimly, "if a spear through his midriff be enough for him. Truly the ancient shafts are useless in close fight, save for a single thrust. I, for one, welcome the Greek equipment--and the sooner the better."

Suddenly Sergius stopped and laid his hand upon his comrade's arm.

"Look!" he said.

A long, low rampart seemed to rise up from the plain two hundred yards ahead.

"Their camp," said the decurion, after a short pause, "and deserted. Let us go forward cautiously; perhaps we shall find food."

Step by step they crept up, walking faster and more erect as they drew nearer and as the evidence that life was not there became more apparent.

"They have left it only to-night," said Decius, clambering up the mound of earth and sniffing the air. "Had it been a day old, we should have smelt it long ago, though the wind blows from us."

Then, as they descended and traversed the silent lanes, a puzzled expression came to his face, and he halted from time to time.

Sergius eyed him inquiringly.

"Do you not smell fresh blood?" said the veteran, at last. "I remember when we marched with Lucius Aemilius, after the Gauls had beaten the praetor's army at Clusium. There were ten thousand men just slain, and the air was salt like the sea--by Jupiter! What is this?"

Resuming their advance, they had come upon a space of open ground near the centre of the camp, doubtless the spot reserved for a market; but what meat was it that cumbered the shambles, without buyer or seller? Piled in ghastly heaps, or covering the ground two and three deep, lay a fresh-reaped harvest of corpses, stripped, distorted, gleaming in the moonlight. Could it be that the camp had been taken? But these were no African dead, nor yet was this a Roman camp. There was a set deliberation, too, about the slaughter, that told no tale of battle.

Suddenly Decius cried out and, stooping down, raised the hands of one of the victims--hands upon which the shackles still hung.

"Slaves," murmured Sergius; "but why--"

"Say, rather, prisoners," said the centurion, grimly.

Sergius struck his thigh. It was all clear to him now.

"May the plague fall upon him! may he go to a thousand crosses! Do you not see? He is _escaping_. He has made for the passes and slain his prisoners, that they may not hamper his march. Who knows but that by now he is on the road to Rome? Gods! This was Hostilius' duty and mine, and we wasted our time and our men on a few score of miserable Numidians. Come, my Marcus, come: there are no such things as wounds or weariness or caution. We must reach the dictator at once, and may the gods grant that it be not too late!"

Marcus Decius had been gazing gloomily at the young man, as the words burst from his lips.

"Where shall we go, and how?" he said, with a despairing gesture.

"On our feet," cried Sergius. "Did I not say that weariness and wounds were not? It is for the life of the Republic: I to the camp near Casilinum; you to Tarracina. They will march by the Appian or by the Latin Way, if they strike for Rome. If not, the plan may not be fatal."

Decius yielded to the decision of his companion, and, with hasty fingers, they unlaced each other's corselets and hurried out of the camp, each to run his race with what strength remained. The last clasp of hands had been given and received, when, far away on the hills east and northeast, the quick eye of Sergius caught the gleam of a rapidly moving torch: then another and another and another seemed to flame out in the night, like stars when the moon has failed, until the whole range of heights blazed with fires that flashed and danced and crossed and recrossed each other in mad confusion, as if all the thronging bacchanals of Greece had assembled for one frenzied orgy.

Dazed and confounded by the spectacle, as grand as it was weird and unexplainable, they stood spell-bound, powerless each to take the first stride. Decius, the older man, the veteran, turned to his companion, yielding that unconscious homage to birth and rank and education, that comes in the presence of unknown perils. No experience of war could help him here, and his mind leaped at once to the supernatural for an explanation. As for the tribune, such thoughts, at least, had not occurred to him. Greek scepticism had already gained too strong a hold upon young Romans of rank, to let them regard the theology of the State other than as a machinery devised by wise men to control an ignorant rabble. Besides, his mind had taken another direction from the discovery of the slaughter of the prisoners, and, humanlike, it ran on in its channel, right or wrong.

Decius was trembling violently.

"Truly, master, the gods of Carthage are loose to-night," said he.

There was even a little of contempt in the glance with which Sergius noted the abject terror of the sturdy veteran. Utterly at a loss to explain the apparitions, he never doubted for a moment but that they were the product of some human wile.

"Come," he said shortly. "The gods of Carthage have favoured us in lighting the way. First of all, we shall go together and learn the truth." Without waiting for a reply, he set off, at an easy, loping gait, in the direction of the strange fires. Decius followed, as he would have followed through the portals of Avernus.

The distance to the heights was not great,--four or five miles at the utmost,--but half an hour had passed, and still the spectacle, wilder and more brilliant than ever, remained unexplained. For a stretch of miles, the hills above, beyond, and below were all ablaze with rushing flames that seemed guided by no sentient agency; then, suddenly, a single torch glanced out from a small grove of trees a short distance ahead and darted diagonally across their path. Decius stopped for an instant, with trembling knees; but Sergius bounded forward to intercept the torch-bearer, and the veteran followed from sheer shame.

Up, down to the ground, up again, and then around in frantic waving circles swept the flame: a mad bellowing rolled through the night, until the tribune himself almost checked his stride in awe-struck wonder. The next instant the torch, if torch it was, seemed to flounder to the earth, from which it rose again and came driving directly toward him, explained at last,--an ox with a great bundle of blazing fagots fastened between its horns, blinded, frantic with pain and terror.

Sergius sprang aside, as the beast dashed by; but Decius, roused once more to the possibility of independent thought and action, stepped toward it and, as it passed, plunged his sword between its heaving ribs.

"What now, my master?" he said, flushing with shame at his fears of the last hour--perhaps the bravest hour of his life. "Does the lying Carthaginian seek to terrify Quintus Fabius, the dictator, as he terrified Marcus Decius, the decurion?"

"Yes, truly," replied Sergius, gloomily; "and he will succeed even better. No general, and, least of all, ours, would lead out his army in the night against such a spectacle. Come, it is necessary that we should reach the camp," and, turning once again, they fell to running in a more southern direction, where a dim glow in the sky seemed to tell of the watchfires of an army.

At first no sound broke the stillness of the night, save the laboured breathing of the weary runners and the strokes of their leathern cothurni upon the hard ground; but soon other noises came to mingle with these and, at last, to drown them: the lowing of thousands of cattle, now scattered far and wide over the plain and hillsides, and then the distant clash of arms and the cries of combatants.

Day began to dawn, just as the fugitives came in sight of the Roman camp with the army drawn up behind its ramparts, waiting for they knew not what. Here and there upon the heights they could see small bodies of legionaries who defended themselves against light troops of the enemy, until overwhelmed by the Spanish infantry that scaled the hills and cut them to pieces; while to every prayer that the dictator should march out to their support, he returned one grim answer.

"They deserted their posts in the passes. Rome needs not such soldiers."

So, company by company, the guards of the defiles, terrified or lured away to the ridges by the ruse of the cattle and the blazing fagots, fell ingloriously before their comrades' eyes, as being men not worth the effort to succour. The rear-guard of the invaders had already made its way through the pass, while the Carthaginian van was well on into the valley of the Volturnus. Now, too, the African light troops disappeared, and, at last, the white tunics of the Spaniards, gay with their purple borders, glittered for a moment on the hilltops, and then, their work of death completed, sank away behind the ridges to fall back and join their comrades in a march of new destruction through a new country.

VIII.

DISGRACE.

While these things were happening, for the most part in the sight of all, Sergius had been able to gain a moment's speech with the dictator. Forcing his way through the crowd of tribunes and officers who thronged the praetorium, he had found Fabius seated before his tent, and had told his story in the fewest words possible.

Naked but for his torn tunic and his cothurni, covered from head to foot with blood and mire, his left arm hanging useless, and his face like the face of a dead man, neither his miserable plight nor his story brought softness to the stern lips and brow of the general.

"You have come to tell me this?" he said, when the other had finished speaking. "Do I not know it _now_?" and he pointed to the heights. Then he turned away and spoke with some one at his side, while Sergius stood, with downcast eyes, swaying and scarcely able to keep his feet.

Among those around him his fate seemed hardly a matter of conjecture, but a thrill went through the company when Minucius, who had been vainly urging the dictator to support the guards of the passes, now turned away in disgust, and, noting the disgraced officer, as if for the first time, cried out in a loud voice:--

"What, my friend! have not the lictors attended to you, yet, for venturing to play the man?"

Sergius felt the added danger to which the master-of-the-horse had exposed him by using his insubordination to point such a moral to his commander; but the face of the dictator gave no sign that he had even heard the taunting challenge. Calmly he gave his orders for cautious scouting, for breaking camp, and for the army to resume its patient march of observation, along the flank of the retiring foe. Then, when one after another had retired to fulfil his commands, he turned again to the waiting tribune.

"I have been considering your fault," he said slowly, "and I had marked you out as a much needed victim for the rods and axe. Go to my master-of-the-horse and thank him for your life. His taunt was doubtless meant to destroy you, in order that he might play the demagogue over your fate. I accept it as a challenge to my self-control. It is more necessary that I should show myself wise and forbearing than that one fool should perish for his folly. Go back to Rome, and tell them that I have many soldiers who can fight, and that I want only those who can obey."