ad heard. And, because again he could
not understand, he put upon them his own interpretation. But he at once
began to make a tale about that old man, with his silver beard and his
smiling eyes; and so he fell asleep, thinking that that was all there
was in it.

When he awoke at break of dawn, he was inclined to think the whole a
dream. But there was a new and softer mood upon him, greatly surprising
to himself, and the black soul within him was tamed and stilled. So, in
blindly superstitious obedience to the word of the strange old man, he
turned his face away from Londinium and all that he longed to find
there, back toward the life which was his, and the work which was his,
and the Isle of Brambles in the fords.

And so came Fate, hard following on his heels.

II

For out of the gray mists of morning came soldiers, six or eight, with
ring of weapons and shuffling thud of feet; and with them was a
centurion in command. These overtook Nicanor where he went slowly back
toward Thorney; and the centurion laid a rough hand upon him and bade
him halt. Nicanor turned; but before he could ask angrily why they had
stopped him, his wrists were fast in handcuffs and he was a prisoner in
chains. He turned upon the centurion.

"Now what is this? I have done no wrong. I demand release!"

"Demand if it please thee," the soldier said. "But in truth I think thee
something more than fool to let thyself be thus caught doddering by the
way. To escape once, and baffle all the great lord Eudemius's searchers,
and then be stumbled upon like any sheep--faugh! I expected better
things of thee!"

"Now have I naught at all to do with the lord Eudemius!" said Nicanor.
He explained, carefully, who he was, and whence he came and to whom he
belonged, and they turned a deaf ear to him. He was the man they
sought, even the slave of Eudemius, escaped three days ago, with a
reward out for his capture. This last explained it, but that Nicanor
could not know. They insisted that they were in the right; all he could
say and do would not convince them otherwise.

They skirted around Londinium by a street lined widely with tombs, and
struck a road leading south and slightly west, which the men, talking
among themselves, named the Noviomagus road. Ten miles, and they reached
the station known by that name, and here took horse, with Nicanor
mounted behind a guard. The road led through the neck of the great
forest of Anderida, and came out again into