ed 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 thro