his knotted stick as
viciously, as though he had to defend himself against an attack. Antinous
felt much disgusted by the hideous appearance, the coarse manners, and
shrill voices of these persons, and when he rose--as the cynics' diatribe
seemed especially directed against him--they scoffed at him as he went,
mocking at his costume and his oiled and perfumed hair. The Bithynian
made no reply to this abuse. It was odious to him, but he thought it
might perhaps have amused Caesar.

He wandered on without thinking; the street in which he presently found
himself must no doubt lead to the sea, and if he could once find himself
on the shore he could not fail to make his way to Lochias. By the time it
was growing dark he was once more standing outside the little gate-house,
and there he learnt from Doris that the Roman and her son had not yet
returned.

What was he to do alone in the vast empty palace? Were not the very
slaves free to-day? Why should not he too for once enjoy life
independently and in his own way? Full of the pleasant sense of being his
own master and at liberty to walk in a road of his own choosing, he went
onwards, and when he presently passed by the stall of a flower-seller, he
began once more to think eagerly of Selene and the nosegay, which must
long since have reached her hands.

He had heard from Pollux in the morning that the steward's daughter was
being tended by Christians in a little house not far from the sea-shore;
indeed the sculptor himself had been quite excited as he told Antinous
that he himself had peeped into the lighted room and had seen her. 'A
glorious creature' he had called her, and had said that she had never
looked more beautiful than in a recumbent attitude on her bed.

Antinous recalled all this and determined to venture on an attempt to see
again the maiden whose image filled his heart and brain.

It was now dark and the same light which had allowed of the sculptor's
seeing Selene's features might this evening reveal them to him also. Full
of passion and excitement, he got into the first litter he met with. The
swarthy bearers were far too slow for his longing, and more than once he
flung to them as much money as they were wont to earn in a week, to urge
them to a brisker pace. At last he reached his destination; but seeing
that several men and women robed in white, were going into the garden, he
desired the bearers to carry him farther. Close to a dark narrow lane
which bou