Sergius was stooping over the dead man, searching for something.
"It is the ring," he said; "the ring with the seal of the Great Council of which he spoke. How else should we pa.s.s the guard at the gate?"
A moment later he rose, and, going to the light, examined carefully the several rings taken from the priest"s-fingers.
One by one they dropped and rolled away over the floor. The last only remained, and Marcia, looking over his shoulder, saw a heavy, gold signet bearing the device of a horse under a palm tree.
"Come now," he said, taking her hand. He had thrust the long knife of Iddilcar into the girdle of his tunic, and this was their only weapon.
So, leading Marcia, he quickly traversed the halls and courts and gained the door, which hung ajar and unattended. Outside, a company of five men were gathered, all mounted. Two were apparently soldiers, a sort of guard; the rest were servants. Heavy looking packages were bound, behind them, on their horses" backs, doubtless the money which Iddilcar had gotten, while two extra animals, saddled and bridled, were held in waiting.
The heart of Sergius leaped as he noted the fine, small heads and slender, muscular legs that marked the Asian stock of their mounts.
Iddilcar had provided well for all emergencies; but Sergius felt some anxiety lest a chance glimpse of his face might lead to detection. The sky in the east was already beginning to lighten, and there were more men of the escort than he had antic.i.p.ated. Speech would be fatal; therefore he strode quickly out, took the bridle of one of the horses from the man who held it, and swung himself upon its back. To a.s.sist Marcia could not be done without exciting suspicion, and he ground his teeth when she tried to follow his example, and one of the servants laughed and pushed her roughly into the saddle. Then they rode on, and the others followed, whispering together.
He had m.u.f.fled his face a trifle too closely, perhaps, and he had mounted the horse standing, whereas all knew that the Cappadocians were trained to kneel at the word. Therefore the men of the escort wondered, though they hardly ventured to suspect.
Marcia felt, rather than noted, their att.i.tude, and Sergius, glancing toward her, saw that she was trembling. He urged his horse faster toward the gate that opened upon the Appian Way; boldness and speed were all that could save them. Suddenly the gate loomed up, gray and ma.s.sive, in the mist of the early morning. Several soldiers lounged forward from the guardhouse, whence came the rattle of dice and the shrill laughter of a woman. Sergius showed his ring and said nothing, while Marcia came close to him, shivering, for the morning air was chill and biting. Their followers had drawn rein, and were gathered in a little clump several spear-lengths behind.
Meanwhile the soldiers, Spaniards they seemed, were gazing stupidly at the device on the seal and making irrelevant comments. It was evident that their night had been spent among the wineskins, and that a new danger menaced.
Summoning what Punic he knew, Sergius leaned forward and asked in a low but stern voice to see their officer. Fortunately his own followers were too far away to hear his words, and drunken Iberians would not be critical as to a faulty Punic accent.
Still they hesitated, chattered together, and stared, but at last one who seemed more sober than the rest reeled away to the guard-house, and, after some delay and evident persuasion, emerged again with a young officer whose moist, hanging lips and filmy eyes showed that he, too, had been dragged from the pursuit of pleasure. Helmetless and with loosened corselet, every detail of his appearance told the story of relaxed discipline.
"What do you want? at this hour?" he said thickly, ambling forward and leaning heavily upon the shoulder of his scarcely more steady guide.
Again Sergius held out the ring, and the man, being a native Carthaginian, recognized it through the mist of his intoxication, and, throwing himself at full length, touched the earth with his forehead.
"What do you wish?" he said, rising and standing, somewhat sobered by the presence of such authority.
"Open the gate. I ride under orders of the schalischim," said the Roman, again speaking low and rapidly.
The officer turned and shouted to his men, and several ran to unbar the gate with such speed as their condition warranted. The other occupants of the guard-house were now grouped at the door, five men, half armed, and two dishevelled women with painted faces and flower-embroidered pallas.
The gate swung slowly on its hinges.
"The light of the Baals be with you, friend!" exclaimed Sergius, and he and Marcia rode through, with hearts beating madly. Voices raised in discussion made them turn in their saddles. In his drunken stupidity, the Carthaginian officer was trying to detain their escort and servants. "The master had said nothing about them. How did he know they belonged to the same party?" Then all began gesticulating and shouting to Sergius for help and explanation.
Here was an unforeseen incident, and the mind of the young Roman viewed it rapidly in all its lights. On the one side, he would be relieved of an awkward following that might at any moment begin to suspect him; on the other hand to leave these in the lurch would be to invite prompt suspicion. Still, they were fifty yards or more in advance, their horses were good, and more s.p.a.ce would be gained before the tangle at the gate could be straightened out; therefore he waved his arm, as if making some signal, and, turning again in his saddle, rode on, but without increasing his speed.
Louder shouts followed him, for, as he had intended, his gesture had proved unintelligible. Then, when they saw he did not stop, the cries ceased suddenly and an animated chattering came to his ears. Here was suspicion trying to make itself understood and, at last, succeeding, for, as Sergius glanced back once more to note how the matter progressed, the young captain of the gate sprang forward and shouted for him to halt.
"A third altar--to Mercury the hastener!" exclaimed Sergius. "Quick now! with the knees!" and, pressing the flanks of his Cappadocian, both animals bounded forward into a headlong gallop.
XIII.
WINTER QUARTERS.
The beat of hoofs upon the great blocks of basalt rang through the morning air in measured cadence, and soon an answering echo came up from the south. Open flight had at last dispelled all doubt and given the signal for pursuit.
First came the two Africans of the original escort, released and bidden to ride for life or death; a short distance behind was the Carthaginian captain on his own horse which had probably been haltered behind the guard-house; and, last of all, three of the Spanish guard, who had thrown the servants and baggage from the animals that bore them, and appropriated such speed as these afforded for the business in hand.
That the officer was pretty well sobered seemed apparent. A fugitive bearing the ring of the schalischim--the seal of the Great Council--must be a man of importance, or else the possession of such a talisman augured the commission of some terrible crime. Already he saw himself stretched writhing upon the cross; the crowd, reviling or gibing, seemed surging about his feet; and his howls of anguish found voice in a storm of guttural objurgations to men and horses, mingled with prayers and vows to the G.o.ds of Carthage.
He had overtaken the two Africans now, for his animal was better than theirs, but the three others laboured hopelessly behind: the Cappadocians flew rather than galloped far in advance. Already nearly three hundred yards separated them from their pursuers, and the gap was widening slowly but surely. Only the officer held his own, for he was now forging ahead of the Africans.
"Ah, cowards! slime! filth!" he shouted to his struggling men. "The cross! the cross! that for you unless we catch them! that for me!--for all! Ah, Eschmoun! Ah, Khamon!--Melkarth!--gifts!--gold, gems, robes, spices!--my first-born to the Baals! to the Baals! Help! speed!"
The man was mad--mad indeed with terror and newly dispelled drunkenness; and his horse, a great African, coal-black save for one white hoof, seemed to partake of his master"s frenzy. With ears lying flat along his head, and eyes that burned into those of Sergius, when he ventured to glance behind him,--glaring sheer through distance and dust like the very eyes of those demons his rider invoked,--the beast thundered on, equalling the speed of the light Asiatic chargers by the force of strength alone.
From time to time the fugitives turned their heads to measure the distance, and the sight of this unwearied pursuer appeared to fascinate them as by some weird power. The rest were beaten out,--the Spaniards lost to sight, the Africans visible only by the dust that hung over them far behind.
The mountains to the eastward seemed to be dancing away in a mad chase toward the south, a chase which Tifata itself was urging on. The glimmer of white in the north told of the morning sun striking upon houses. Still they rode on, pursuers and pursued.
Suddenly a sound, half-trumpet note, half bellow, swelled up ahead.
Then another answered it, and another and another took up the refrain.
Sergius" face blanched, and, with a sudden effort, he threw his animal almost upon its haunches. Marcia was carried several spear-lengths farther before she could check her speed. Wonder and the dread of some accident drove the blood to her heart. A hoa.r.s.e shout of triumph came from their pursuer, as she turned to ride back.
She asked no questions. Surely Sergius knew what was best. She saw Iddilcar"s long dagger in his hand, and that he was about to fight.
"Back!--back! and to one side," he called, as she rode up. "Did you not hear the elephants? That is Casilinum, and they are besieging it.
We should have remembered."
He darted forward to meet the Carthaginian, fearful that he, too, would draw rein and await the coming of his followers. Then indeed all would be lost. Six soldiers on the one side and a camp full on the other were hopeless odds against a wounded man armed only with a Numidian dagger.
But it was Bacchus that fought for Rome that day--Bacchus, to whom no altar had been vowed. A night of debauchery and the sudden terror of its awakening had effectually blurred whatever judgment the officer may have had, and his one thought was to kill or capture his quarry.
So they came together, Sergius swerving his Cappadocian as they met.
The officer struck blindly, but the good lord Bacchus put out his hand and turned the blow aside. Then, as they parted, a strange thing happened. Marcia had wondered dimly why Sergius struggled with the long, girdleless garment of Iddilcar, tearing it off as he rode. Now, when the two horses sprang apart, she saw that he had thrown it dexterously over the Carthaginian, blinding his blow and tangling him in its heavy folds.
Prompt to respond to knee and rein, the Cappadocian wheeled, almost as soon as he ran clear, but the African thundered on, while its rider cursed in blind terror and tried to check his horse and to free his face and sword-arm. A moment, and he had succeeded, but he succeeded too late. The Roman was at his back, and Marcia saw the long dagger rise and fall in a swift thrust. She could not see how the point took its victim just at the nape; but she saw him pitch forward like an ox under the axe.
Almost before she could grasp what had happened, Sergius was beside the fallen man, had resumed the priest"s tunic, red with new blood stains, and was on his horse again. His brow lay in deep lines as he rode toward her.
"Come," he said. "The G.o.ds favouring us, we must pa.s.s their camp before the rest come up. Grant that those may linger by the corpse, and that we meet no check."
Again they were galloping toward the lines that lay about Casilinum.
All had happened so quickly that even now they could scarcely see the plume in the distant dust cloud that told where the pursuers straggled on. They had turned into the new side-road without meeting a man.
Then a small foraging party halted them, and Sergius showed the seal and spoke in Gallic to its Numidian leader. A little farther on was stationed another band, and here the delay was longer ere his halting Punic convinced the Spanish piquet, and they again rode forward unsuspected. All had bowed low to the horse and the palm tree, and no one dared question what weighty mission urged on the man in the torn and blood-stained tunic and the slender youth, his companion.
Now they were back again upon the pavement of the Appian; the last line was pa.s.sed, and the beleaguered town with its stout-hearted garrison lay well behind. Perhaps that sudden uproar told of the arrival of their pursuers; perhaps those glittering points amid distant dust clouds meant a new pursuit. Surely none but Mercury had winged the feet of the Cappadocians! Unwearied, like springs of steel, the stout muscles drove them on--on over the marshland with the glint of the sea before them--on, up the rising ground.
Again and again Sergius turned in his saddle scanning the road behind, feeling the presence of pursuers whom he could not see. The good horses were weakening fast. No flesh and blood could stand that strain, and naught but the spirit of the breed kept them afoot.
Marcia"s was limping painfully; the one Sergius rode was wavering in its stride, like the Carthaginian captain when he came out of the guard-house by the gate.