Sight-seeing in Rome, in the guise of Gallic wastrels, under the tutelage of a harborside slum host, was truly an experience for me after my former station as a nobleman of the Republic, and my ruin and disguise and flight. I positively enjoyed it.
First of all Colgius was for showing us over the stables of the Reds, for he was mad about racing and boasted that he had bet on the Reds since he was six years old and his father gave him his first copper. But I demurred and pointed out that none of the racing-stables were fit places for us, since a steady stream of Spanish horses trickled through Marseilles and on through Vada Sabatia and Genoa to Rome, and there was too great a probability that we might come face to face with some groom, hostler or hanger-on from Marseilles who would know us at sight. Colgius yielded to this argument and agreed that we must avoid all the racing stables. This greatly relieved us, since, while neither I nor Agathemer had been devotees of the sport, both of us had been through all six establishments often enough to be likely to be recognized in any one of them.
Baffled in his first choice and, apparently, in his only choice, Colgius asked us what we wanted to see. I said I wanted most to see a day of racing in the circus, blurting out this rather foolish utterance without reflection, merely because I thought it would seem natural to him. He replied that that would be easy, but that the next racing day was day after tomorrow: what would we like to do today?
I said I wanted first of all to be shown the Temple of Mercury, for I wanted to make an offering to the god.
"Oh, yes," he said, "Mercury is your chief god in Gaul, isn't he, and you put him ahead of Jupiter. What is it you call him?"
"You are thinking of the Belgians," I said, "and of the Gauls in the Valley of the Liger. They call Mercury Tiv or Tir and regard him as their chief god. But we provincials never had any such ideas: we worship the same gods as you, in the same way. But I, personally, while revering Jupiter as king of the gods, have always particularly sought the favor of Mercury."
Off we went to the meat market and I bought there two white hens, as on the day of my flight, more than a year before. With one under each arm I then followed Colgius to the Temple of Mercury and there made my prayers and offering.
When we came out he, of course, began to display the outside of the Great Circus and to tell me of its glories, which, he said, he would show me from the inside the day after tomorrow. The life there was much as Maternus and I had seen it twenty-three days before.
We could not avoid following Colgius about Rome, round the Palatine, the Colosseum and the Baths of Titus and through the Forums of Vespasian, Nerva, Augustus and Trajan. At Trajan's Temple he reiterated his regrets that we dare not go on to the stables of the Reds, and turned back through Trajan's Forum, the Forum of the Divine Julius and the Great Forum. Of course, I was quaking with dread for fear some lifelong acquaintance would recognize me, even in my coarse attire. But none did: in fact I set eyes on no one I knew, except Faltonius Bambilio, who was pompously lecturing ten victims in the Ulpian Basilica. I was certain that his eyes were only on his auditors; the sight of him did not alarm me, he never paid any attention to those he considered his inferiors.
All along Agathemer and I were bursting with suppressed giggles: Colgius paid very little attention to the Palace, the Great Amphitheater, the magnificent public baths, the temples or to any of the glories about us; he was all for cook-shops and hauled us into cook-shops without number, sometimes presenting his Gallic friends, Asper and Felix, to his good friend, the proprietor, sometimes bursting into invectives against the bad cookery, infinitesimal portions or absurd prices of his enemies' establishments. In cook-shops Agathemer and I felt safe, near a cook-shop we felt almost safe, between cook-shops, companioned by Colgius and any cook-shop frequenters we met, we felt more than a little safe. To our thinking no spy, informer or secret service agent would feel suspicious towards Colgius and his friends, nor towards us in their company, and he presented us to idlers, loafers, louts, betting agents, sellers of tips on the races, friends of jockeys, cousins of hostlers and such like to an amazing number.
We found all Rome, as we saw it in the company of Colgius, humming with two names and we made sure that, if they buzzed in such company as we were in they also formed the chief topics of conversation in all parts of the city and at every level of society from the senators down.
One name we had heard when in Rome with Maternus, but had barely heard it; now we heard it everywhere; the name of Palus, the charioteer; Palus, the incomparable jockey; Palus, the king of horsemasters; Palus the chum of Commodus. Both of him, and about him, not only from the men who talked to us, but also from bystanders, diners and idlers, who never noticed us or knew that we overheard them, we heard the most amazing stories:
He could guide six horses galloping abreast between the test-pillars for tyros driving four-abreast and never jostle a pillar or throw a horse; he had done it time after time; he had won three races, driving seven horses abreast, his competitors driving four abreast; he had won a race, with a team of four Cappodocian stallions, guiding them without reins, by his voice only; he was the most graceful charioteer, bar no one, ever seen in Rome.
As to his origin and personality the stories were not only fantastic, but divergent, contradictory or incompatible.
If we might believe what we heard he had been presented to Commodus by the same nobleman who had presented Murmex Lucro, and on the very next day; he was from Apulia; he was a Roman all his days; he was a Sabine; he was a nobleman in disguise, he had been a foundling brought up in the Subura; he was a half brother of Commodus, offspring of an amour between Faustina and a gladiator, reared in Samnium on a farm, lately recognized and accepted by the Emperor; he was Commodus himself in disguise.
All this, you may be sure, made us prick up our ears. Still more did we at the sound of the other much-bandied name. Here again the tales were varied, inconsistent, antagonistic.
But the name!
That name was:
Marcia!
Marcia was in control of Commodus, of the Emperor, of the Republic, of the Empire. She was domiciled in the Palace, she was treated as Empress, she had all the honors ever accorded an Empress except that she never participated in public sacrifices or other ceremonial rituals. Crispina had been divorced and was no longer Empress, but had been relegated, under guard, to a distant island; Crispina was still Empress, but had withdrawn in disdain from the Palatine, occupied the Vectilian Palace on the Caelian Hill, still received Commodus when he visited her, but would not set foot on the Palatine nor take part in any ritual or ceremonial; Crispina had been murdered by Marcia's orders, in her presence, with the Emperor's consent; Marcia got on well with the Empress, there was no jealousy between them, Crispina was glad to have someone who could soothe Commodus in his periodic rages and humor him when he sulked; every possible variety of story about Crispina was told, but every tale represented Marcia as undisputed and indisputable mistress of the Palace and of everybody in it.
Of her origin we heard mostly versions of the true story; often we heard named Hyacinthus and Ummidius Quadratus, never my uncle nor Marcus Martius. We dared not seem to know anything about Marcia and so could not name Marcus Martius or ask after him. From all the talk we heard, addressed to us or about us, his name was as absent as if he had never existed.
How Marcia came to the Emperor's attention, won his notice, acquired her mastery of him, as to all this we heard not one word: of her complete control of him and of all Rome everyone talked openly.
The next day we escaped the unwelcome attention of Colgius because Maganno came after us to introduce us to the captain who was to take us to Antioch, to show us his ship, and to make sure we knew the wharf at which she lay and how to reach her. The ship was to sail two days later. The captain's name was Orontides, which struck both me and Agathemer as being the same as that of the most fashionable jeweler in Rome, whose grandfather had come from Antioch, where, I suppose, the name would be as natural and frequent as Tiberius with us.
He was a Syrian Greek, with curly brown hair and brown eyes, by no means so wind-tanned and weather-beaten as Maganno, but manifestly a seaman. He was bow-legged and had very large flat feet.
Orontides looked us over, approved us, required a deposit of twenty gold pieces, counted them, said we might pay the rest of his charges at Antioch, and we shook hands on the bargain.
Yet, as the cost of the voyage would land us in Syria with but a few coins, it was well for us that, later in the day, Agathemer found a dealer in gems lately come to Rome and sold him another jewel. This filled our pouches and left us certain of having gold to spare until he could manage to find a purchaser for yet another gem in Antioch or elsewhere.
Colgius, when we returned to our lodgings, talked of nothing but the Games which were to be celebrated next day. He first exhibited the togas which he had hired for us to wear; we, as fugitives, having, of course, no togas of our own. We found them clean and tried them on. Colgius approved and went on with his enthusiasm.
There were to be twenty-four faces, all of four-horse chariots only, twelve in the morning, of six chariots, one for each of the racing companies; twelve in the afternoon, of twelve chariots, two for each of the racing companies. Colgius discoursed at length as to his opinions concerning the six companies, inveighing against the Golds and the Crimsons, declaring that they were rich men's companies, in which only senators and nobles took any interest and the existence of which spoiled racing.
"You never heard of a plain man like me betting on the Crimson or the Gold," he ranted, "all folks of moderate means, all the plain people, all the populace, bet on the Reds, Whites, Greens or Blues. I agree that the Greens are the most popular company, most popular with all classes from the senators and nobles to the poorest, but I will never admit, as many claim, that the Blues have the second place in the affections of the people; the Blues, I maintain, come third and the Reds have second place with all classes. The Whites are a strong fourth. But, as to the Golds and the Crimsons, no one ever lays a wager on them except the enormously rich nobles and senators whose ancestors organized them under Domitian a hundred years ago. But they, being so enormously rich, can buy the best horses and have the best jockeys. Now they have Palus. The Reds have Scopas and the Greens Diocles, and both have been wonderful, but Palus can beat anybody.
"They say he has wagered an enormous sum that he will win all of the twelve races in which he is to run, the first six odd numbers and the last six even numbers, and that he will do so in a previously specified way; that he will take and keep first place in the first race; that, in the others he will, at the start, take second place, third place and so on progressively further back in each, till he lets the whole of five get ahead of him in the eleventh race and the whole field of eleven have the start of him in the last race."
Colgius was afraid Palus would succeed in doing precisely what he purposed. The Reds, if they won any races, must win in those in which Palus did not start. He judged they could not hope to win more than eight of those twelve. He was gloomy.
Next day dawned fair, mild, and with a gentle breeze, perfect weather for spending a day in the Circus. To this Agathemer and I looked forward with some trepidation, for service men, spies and informers were always in all parts of the Circus and one might recognize me. But we comforted ourselves with the hope that they were no longer on the lookout for me. If I knew the ways of secret-service men I conjectured that they would never have been willing to report the truth: that they could find no trace of me, that I had vanished utterly and completely. I would have been willing to wager that, within a month of my disappearance, some corpse somewhere was identified as mine and my suicide reported as verified; which report had probably been accepted at the Palace; whereafter I would be off the minds of all secret-service men everywhere. Therefore I felt reasonably sure that no agent would be on the lookout for me. Of course there was a chance that one might recognize me by accident. But this was so unlikely that we did not worry over it much.
I was more concerned for fear of arousing suspicion in Colgius by not behaving as he would expect a Gallic Provincial to behave at his first sight of the great games in the Circus Maximus. I could not be sure at what he would expect me to exclaim, what I ought to wonder at and remark on to seem natural in my assumed role of Marseilles scapegrace.
We were a party of eight, Colgius, his wife Posilla, and two teamsters or drovers named Ramnius and Uttius, who conveyed goods or convoyed cattle between Ostia and the markets of Rome. They had their wives with them, but I forget their names. The three women were arrayed in wonderful costumes of cheap fabrics dyed in gaudy hues and adorned with jewelry of gilt or silvered bronze set with bits of colored glass. I had seen such at a distance, but never so close.
Both Agathemer and I liked Ramnius and Uttius; we felt at ease with them at first sight. And they were evidently intimates of Colgius and high in his favor. He and they wore their togas with all the awkwardness to be expected from men who donned togas only for Circus games and Amphitheatre shows. To my amazement I found myself really delighted at again wearing a toga. Like all gentlemen I had always loathed the hot, heavy things. But I found myself positively thrill at being again garbed as befits a Roman on a holiday or at a ceremonial. Besides I found that a toga, over a poor man's tunic, was not nearly so uncomfortable as it was over the more complicated garb of a fashionable person of means and position.
The interior of the Circus, from my novel location, appeared sufficiently strange to lull my dread that I might seem too familiar with it. Of course we were very far back, only five rows in front of the arcade, whereas as long as I was a nobleman of Rome in good standing, I had always sat in the second tier, far forward.
But what made much more difference than sitting far back and high up instead of well forward and low down was that we were on the other side of the Circus from my old seat and almost directly opposite it. I had always sat in section E, about the middle of the east side of the Circus and not far from the Imperial Pavilion in section C. We were in section P, directly facing E, and not far from the judges' stand in section O.
Now from where I had been used to sitting, facing a little south of west, I had viewed only the tiers of seats and of spectators, the upper arcade, and, above that the roofs of the not very lofty, large or magnificent temples on the Aventine Hill. From where we sat with Colgius we faced the Palatine and I was overwhelmed by the vastness, beauty and grandeur of the great mass of buildings which make up the Imperial Palace. On a festival day, of course, they were exceptionally gorgeous, for every window was garlanded at the top and most displayed tapestries or rugs hung over the sill, every balcony was decorated similarly and with greater care than the windows, and every window, balcony and portico was a mass of eager faces. Especially my eye was caught by the crowd of Palace officials and servants on the bulging loggia built by Hadrian in order to be able to catch glimpses of games when he was too busy to occupy the Imperial Pavilion in the Circus itself. That Pavilion, as yet occupied only by a few guards, I gazed at with mixed feelings.
Colgius put Agathemer next him, then me; beyond me sat Ramnius and his wife and then Uttius and his. But across Posilla we were introduced to two cattle inspectors named Clitellus and Summanus of whom we felt uncomfortably suspicious from the instant we laid eyes on them. They looked to me like secret-service agents and Agathemer nodded towards them, when they were not looking, raised his eyebrows and touched his lips.
I for some time satiated myself with gazing at the Palace, with admiring the wonderful charm of the outlook from this side of the Circus, with revelling in the sense of delight at being again in it, with feasting my eyes on its gorgeousness, on the magnificence of its vastness, of its colonnade, of its costly marbles, of its tiers of seats, of the obelisks, shrines, monuments and other decorations of the spina.
Then, after the upper seats were well packed with commonality, the gentry and nobility began to dribble into the lower tiers and even a few senatorial parties entered their boxes in the front row. I began to peer at party after party, outwardly trying to keep my face blank, inwardly excited at the probability of recognizing many former friends and acquaintances.
The first man I recognized was Faltonius Bambilio, unmistakably pompous and self-satisfied. Although a senator he came early. Later I saw Vedius Vedianus and, far from him, Satronius Satro. Didius Julianus, always the most ostentatious of the senators, was unmistakable even in section B, further from me than any part of the Circus except the left hand starting stalls and their neighborhood.
I looked for Tanno in section D, and early made him out.
But, even after the equestrian seats and senatorial boxes had all filled, nowhere could I descry any feminine shape at all suggestive of Vedia. I was still peering and sweeping the senatorial seats with my eyes, hoping to espy her, when the bugles announced the Emperor's approach and the audience stood up. My eyes were on the Imperial Dais watching for the appearance of the Emperor. But when he came into sight, and I joined in the cheers, I viewed without emotion this man, who had honored me with his favor, yet who had credited to the utmost, without investigation, my inclusion among the number of his dangerous enemies. I reflected that no man accused of participating in a conspiracy against any Prince of the Republic had ever been given any sort of hearing or his friends allowed to try to clear him.
I used all my powers of eyesight to con the Emperor, distinctive in his official robes but too far off to be seen well. He appeared to me to have lost something of his elegance of carriage and grace of movement. He seemed less elastic in bearing, less springy of gait. There was, even at that distance, something familiar in his attitude and stride, but it did not seem precisely the presence of Commodus as I had known him. I stared puzzled and groping in my mind. But I felt no emotion as I stared and peered at him.
Oddly enough, from the moment when I received Vedia's letter of warning until I caught sight of the head of the procession about to enter the Circus through the Procession gate, I had had not one instant of despondency or of self-pity. But, at sight of the head of that magnificent procession, a sort of wave of misery surged through me and inundated me with a sudden sense of wistful regret for all that I had lost and also with an acute realization of the precarious hold I had on life, of the peril I was in from hour to hour. This unexpected and unwelcome dejection possessed me until the whole line of floats displaying the images of the gods had passed and the racing chariots came along.
The very first of these drawn by a splendid team of four dapple grays, was driven by a charioteer wearing the colors of the Crimsons' Company. I did not need to hear the exclamation of Colgius:
"There is Palus! That is Palus!" to recognize this Prince of Charioteers. The descriptions I had heard were enough to have told me who he was. For at even a distant sight of him I did not wonder at the tales which gave out that he was a half brother of Commodus, or Commodus in disguise. He was more like Commodus than any half brother would have been likely to have been; like as a twin brother, like enough to be actually Commodus himself. He had all Commodus' comeliness of port and refinement of poise. Every attitude, every movement, was a joy to behold. I stared back and forth from this paragon in a charioteer's tunic to the stolid lump on the Imperial throne, perplexed at the enigma, feeling just on the verge of comprehension, but baffled. I kept gazing from one to the other till Palus rounded the further goal and was largely hidden by the posts, the stand for the bronze tally-eggs, the obelisk and the other ornaments of the spina. [Footnote: See Note G.]
There were about two hundred chariots, for very few teams were entered to race twice. More than a third were driven by charioteers, the rest by grooms, or others, quite competent to control them at a walk, though some of the more fiery had also men on foot holding their bits.
"Felix," Agathemer queried, "did you notice anything peculiar about the first chariot?"
"Yes, Asper," I replied, "I did. I never saw a chariot with its wheels so close together, nor with such long spokes. Its axle is higher from the ground than any I ever set eyes on."
"I recall," said Agathemer, "hearing you recount a lecture on chariot- design you once heard from a man of lofty station."
"The design of that chariot," I replied, "certainly tallies with the design advocated in that lecture. It would seem to indicate that Palus has accepted the views of that very distinguished lecturer."
"Perhaps," said Agathemer drily. "Perhaps it indicates something more notable."
"Perhaps," I admitted.
Most of the teams were white or dapple gray, those being the favorite colors of all the racing companies except the Whites themselves, among whom it was a tradition that teams of their racing-colors were unlucky for them. Next most frequent were bays, then sorrels, while roans and piebalds, as usual, were distinctly scarce. In fact there were but three teams of roans, all with the white colors, and two of piebalds, one belonging to the Greens and one to the Blues. The Blue team caught my eye, even at so great a distance. When it came opposite us I nudged Agathemer and queried:
"Asper, did you ever see any of these horses before?"
"Yea, Felix," he replied. "You are quite right in your judgment; the left- hand yoke-mate is the very stallion you are thinking of, which you and I have seen and handled before to-day. You and I know where you rode him and how he passed out of your ken."
It was, in fact, the trick stallion I had ridden at Reate fair and won as a prize of my riding him, which had been spirited away from my stables not many nights after he came into my possession. At once I foresaw some attempt at altogether unusual trickery in the course of this racing-day. The team of four splendid piebald stallions, about five years old, was one of the few entered for two races. I could not conjecture how a horse which had spent his youth as trick-horse in possession of an itinerant fakir, had acquired, since I knew him, reputation enough to be yoke-mate in a team highly enough thought of to be entered for two races the same day in the Circus Maximus. This was a puzzle almost as absorbing as the likeness and contrast between the Emperor and Palus.
The racing had many remarkable features, but I am concerned to relate only those in which Palus took part.
At once after the procession he drove in the first race, always a perilous honor. When we saw the chariots dart out of the starting-stalls, the Crimson emerged from the stall furthest to the left, just that which is the worst possible position from which to start. Although thus handicapped the Crimson seemed a horse-length ahead before the other chariots had cleared the sills of their stalls and a full chariot-length ahead before it reached the near end of the spina wall. We saw Palus take the wall easily and hold it throughout the race, after the first turn never less than two full chariot-lengths ahead of the Green, which came second. The Red was third, which comforted Colgius a little. As Palus passed the judges' stand he threw up an arm, with a gesture so boyish, so debonair, so graceful, so altogether characteristic of Commodus, that I felt a qualm all over me. And a second gesture of exultation as he vanished through the Gate of Triumph was equally individual.
The Red won the second race, which put Colgius, Uttius and Ramnius in high good humor and seemed to make their fat, smiling wives even more smiling.
Agathemer and I agreed that the rumors retailed by Colgius concerning the wager said to have been made by Palus were probably correct; for he did just what that rumor specified and so singular and spectacular a series of feats could hardly have been fortuitous. It was quite plain that he pulled in his team in the third race, and let a Gold team get the lead of him and keep it till five eggs and five dolphins had been taken down by the tally- keepers' menials and there were but two full laps to run. Then he took the lead easily in the middle of the straight and won by four full lengths.
So of the other races in which he drove. He pulled in his team at the start and each time allowed to get ahead of him one more team than in his last race. Then he joyously and without apparent effort passed first one, in one straight, then another in another, varying his methods from race to race, watching for and seizing his opportunities, biding his time, dashing into top speed as he chose, all smoothly and in perfect form.
The Blue team of piebalds with my trick-stallion among them won the fourth race in which Palus did not compete.
The eleventh race, in which Palus let the whole field of five precede him, was most exciting, especially because of the length of lead he gave even to the fifth team, and the impression of inevitableness about his victory afterwards. The thirteenth, in which he did not drive, was notable for an appalling smash-up of five chariots, in which three jockeys were killed and eight horses killed outright or so badly injured that the clearing- crew had to put them out of their agonies.
The fourteenth race would have been spoiled by an even worse massacre had it not been for the superlative skill of Palus and his amazing luck. He had passed five of the seven chariots which had the lead of him at the start and was a close third to the two Blue teams, with the entire field well up behind, three abreast, mostly, bunched up in a fashion which seldom happens. The whole dozen had gathered way after the tenth turn, as they came up the straight past the judges and us on the first lap, while two eggs and two dolphins still remained on the tally stands. Two thirds up the straight, just when all twelve teams were at their top speed, the Blue chariot furthest out from the spina wall swerved to the right as if the jockey had lost control of his team. Palus lashed his four and they increased their speed as if they had been held in before and darted between the two Blues. As the twelve horses were nose to nose the outer Blue pulled sharply inward in a way which appeared certain to pocket Palus and wreck his team and chariot, but even more certain to wreck the swerving Blue. What Palus did I was too far off to see, but the roar of delight from the front rows, which spread north, south and west till it sounded like surf in a tempest, advertised that he had done something superlatively adequate. Certainly he slipped between the two Blue teams and won his race handily, as he did every other in succession, though eight, nine, ten and eleven chariots led him at the start of each in succession.
"What do you think of that, Asper?" I asked Agathemer.
"Felix," he replied, "there has never been but one man on earth who could manage horses like that. I've seen him do it. I've been smuggled in to watch him, like many another servant supposed to be waiting for his master outside. I recognize the inimitable witchery of him."
"No need to name him," I said. "But if you are right, who is wearing his robes and occupying his usual seat to-day?"
"Don't ask me!" Agathemer replied. "But you yourself, Felix, who have seen him drive so much oftener than I have must agree with me about Palus."
I was mute.
I never saw a better managed racing-day. The first twelve races of six chariots each were over and done with more than an hour before noon and we had plenty of time to eat the abundant lunch Posilla and her two friends had put up for us, to drink all we wanted of the wine served in the tavern in the vault to the left of the entrance stair, underneath the seats of our section, and to return to our seats, refreshed like the rest of that fraction of the spectators which went out and came back, most of them sitting tight in their seats, unwilling to miss any of the tight-rope- walking, jugglers' tricks, fancy riding and rest of the diversions which filled up the noon interval. Also the twelve afternoon races of twelve chariots each were so promptly started, with so little interval between, that the last race was run a full two hours before sunset, while the light was still strong; stronger, in fact, than earlier in the day, for a sort of film of cloud had mitigated the glare of noon, while by the start of the last race the sky was the deepest, clearest blue and the sun's radiance undimmed by any hindrance.
That last race! Palus passed nine competitors in ten half laps, and, in the first half of the sixth lap, was again third to two Blue teams one of which was the piebald team with the Reate trick-stallion as left-hand yoke-mate. Again, as in the fourteenth race, the field was close up, widespread, bunched, and thundering at top speed. Palus was driving the dapple grays with which he had won the first race.
Now, what happened, happened much quicker than it can be told, happened in the twinkling of an eye. The inner leading Blue team apparently hugged the spina wall too close and jammed its left-hand hub-end against the marble, stopping the chariot, so that the axle and pole slewed and so that the horses, since the pole and the traces did not snap, were brought nose on against the wall and piled up horridly, just at the goal-line, opposite the judges stand, and falling so that as they fell they straightened out the pole and brought the chariot to a standstill with its axle neatly across the course.
The other Blue, with the piebalds, was not close in to the leaders, but fairly well out and about a length behind. As the wall-team piled up something happened among the free-running piebalds. Of course, I conjecture that the trick-stallion threw himself sideways at a signal. But it seems incredible that a creature as timid as a horse, so compellingly controlled by the instinct to keep on its feet, should, in the frenzy of the crisis of a race, while in the mad rush of a full-speed gallop, obey a signal so out of variance with his natural impulse. Agathemer vows he saw the trick-stallion throw himself against the chief horse while he and the other two were running strong and true. I did not see that; I only saw the four piebalds go down in a heap in front of their chariot, saw the chariot stop dead, saw, even at that distance, that its axle was perfectly in line with the axle of the other wrecked chariot, both chariots right side up and too close together for any chariot to pass between them.
Palus, skimming the sand not three horse lengths behind the piebalds, was trapped and certain to be piled up against the wrecked Blues, under three or four more of the field thundering behind him.
Actually, at that distance, I saw his pose, the very outline of his neck and shoulders, express not alarm but exultation. Although his right ear and part of the back of his head was towards me, I could almost see him yell. I could descry how the lash of his whip flew over his team, how craftily he managed his reins.
Right at the narrow gap he drove. In it his horses did not jam or fall or stumble or jostle. The yoke-mates held on like skimming swallows, the trace-mates seemed to rise into the air. I seemed to see the two wheels of his chariot interlock with the two wheels of the upright, stationary wrecked chariots, his left-hand wheel between the chariot-body and right- hand wheel of the chariot on his left, his right-hand wheel between the chariot-body and left-hand wheel of the chariot on his right.
Certainly I saw his chariot, with him erect in it, rise in the air, saw it bump on the ground beyond the two stationary chariots, saw it leap up again from its wheels' impact upon the sand, all four of his dapple grays on their feet and running smoothly, saw him speed on and round the upper goal-posts.
As Palus came round the next lap, well ahead of the diminished field, he craftily avoided the heap of wreckage. As he won he dropped his reins altogether, threw up both, arms, and yelled like a lad. As he vanished through the Triumphal Gateway, he again dropped his reins, left his team to guide themselves, and turned half round to wave an exultant farewell to the spectators.
"What do you think, Asper?" I asked Agathemer.
"Felix," said he, "I wouldn't bet a copper that the occupant of the throne is not Commodus. But I'll wager my amulet-bag and all it contains that Palus is not Ducconius Furfur."
He said it under his breath, that I alone might hear.
