ius replied:

"I saw him pass along in his large red cloak, with uplifted arms
and higher than the dust, like an eagle flying upon the flank of the
cohorts; and at every nod they closed up or darted forward; the throng
carried us towards each other; he looked at me, and I felt the cold
steel as it were in my heart."

"He selected the day, perhaps?" whispered Matho to himself.

They questioned each other, trying to discover what it was that had
brought the Suffet just when circumstances were most unfavourable.
They went on to talk over the situation, and Spendius, to extenuate his
fault, or to revive his courage, asserted that some hope still remained.

"And if there be none, it matters not!" said Matho; "alone, I will carry
on the war!"

"And I too!" exclaimed the Greek, leaping up; he strode to and fro, his
eyes sparkling, and a strange smile wrinkled his jackal face.

"We will make a fresh start; do not leave me again! I am not made for
battles in the sunlight--the flashing of swords troubles my sight; it
is a disease, I lived too long in the ergastulum. But give me walls to
scale at night, and I will enter the citadels, and the corpses shall be
cold before cock-crow! Show me any one, anything, an enemy, a treasure,
a woman,--a woman," he repeated, "were she a king's daughter, and I will
quickly bring your desire to your feet. You reproach me for having lost
the battle against Hanno, nevertheless I won it back again. Confess
it! my herd of swine did more for us than a phalanx of Spartans." And
yielding to the need that he felt of exalting himself and taking
his revenge, he enumerated all that he had done for the cause of the
Mercenaries. "It was I who urged on the Gaul in the Suffet's gardens!
And later, at Sicca, I maddened them all with fear of the Republic!
Gisco was sending them back, but I prevented the interpreters speaking.
Ah! how their tongues hung out of their mouths! do you remember? I
brought you into Carthage; I stole the zaimph. I led you to her. I will
do more yet: you shall see!" He burst out laughing like a madman.

Matho regarded him with gaping eyes. He felt in a measure uncomfortable
in the presence of this man, who was at once so cowardly and so
terrible.

The Greek resumed in jovial tones and cracking his fingers:

"Evoe! Sun after run! I have worked in the quarries, and I have drunk
Massic wine beneath a golden awning in a vessel of my own like a
Ptolemaeus. Calamity should help to mak