into a filthy cell, lighted only by a small chink, near the top
of the low stone wall, into which strayed a bit of moonlight. The
night he passed wretchedly enough, on a truss of fetid straw; while
the tight irons that confined him chafed his wrists and ankles.
Needless to add, he cursed roundly all things human and heavenly,
before he fell into a brief, troubled sleep. In the morning Mago, who
acted as jailer, brought him a pot of water and a saucer of uncooked
wheat porridge;[112] and informed him, with a grin, that Natta was
making the beams ready. Agias contented himself by asking Mago to tell
Drusus about him, as soon as the master returned. "You are very young
to wish to die," said the Libyan, grimly. Agias did not argue. Mago
left him. By climbing up a rude stool, Agias could peer through the
loophole, which by great luck commanded a fairly ample view of the
highway. Drusus he naturally expected would come from the south,
toward Praeneste. And thence every moment he trembled lest Dumnorix's
gang should appear in sight. But every distant dust-cloud for a long
time resolved itself sooner or later into a shepherd with a flock of
unruly sheep, or a wagon tugged by a pair of mules and containing a
single huge wine-skin. Drusus came not; Dumnorix came not. Agias grew
weary of watching, and climbed painfully down from the stool to eat
his raw porridge. Hardly had he done so than a loud clatter of hoofs
sounded without. With a bound that twisted his confined ankles and
wrists sadly, Agias was back at his post. A single rider on a handsome
bay horse was coming up from the direction of Rome. As he drew near to
the villa, he pulled at his reins, and brought his steed down to a
walk. The horseman passed close to the loophole, and there was no
mistaking his identity. Agias had often seen that pale, pimpled face,
and those long effeminate curls in company with Lucius Ahenobarbus.
The rider was Publius Gabinius, and the young Greek did not need to be
told that his coming boded no good to Drusus. Gabinius looked
carefully at the villa, into the groves surrounding it, and then up
and down the highway. Then he touched the spur to his mount, and was
gone.

[112] _Puls_, the primitive Italian food.

Agias wrung his manacled hands. Drusus would be murdered, Cornelia's
happiness undone, and he himself would become the slave of Lucius
Ahenobarbus, who, when he had heard Phaon's story, would show little
enough of mercy. He cursed t