ieces," said
my Father.

"'And you on the Wall, among the heather, will weep because your notion
of justice was more to you than the favour of the Emperor of Rome."

'I sat quite still. One does not answer a General who wears the Purple.

"'I am not angry with you," he went on; "I owe too much to your
Father--"

"'You owe me nothing but advice that you never took," said the Pater.

"'--to be unjust to any of your family. Indeed, I say you may make a
good Tribune, but, so far as I am concerned, on the Wall you will live,
and on the Wall you will die," said Maximus.

"'Very like," said my Father. "But we shall have the Picts and their
friends breaking through before long. You cannot move all troops out of
Britain to make you Emperor, and expect the North to sit quiet." "'I
follow my destiny," said Maximus.

"'Follow it, then," said my Father, pulling up a fern root; "and die as
Theodosius died."

"'Ah!" said Maximus. "My old General was killed because he served the
Empire too well. I may be killed, but not for that reason," and he
smiled a little pale grey smile that made my blood run cold.

"'Then I had better follow my destiny," I said, "and take my men to the
Wall."

'He looked at me a long time, and bowed his head slanting like a
Spaniard. "Follow it, boy," he said. That was all. I was only too
glad to get away, though I had many messages for home. I found my men
standing as they had been put--they had not even shifted their feet in
the dust, and off I marched, still feeling that terrific smile like an
east wind up my back. I never halted them till sunset, and'--he turned
about and looked at Pook's Hill below him--'then I halted yonder.' He
pointed to the broken, bracken-covered shoulder of the Forge Hill
behind old Hobden's cottage.

'There? Why, that's only the old Forge--where they made iron once,'
said Dan.

'Very good stuff it was too,' said Parnesius calmly. 'We mended three
shoulder-straps here and had a spear-head riveted. The Forge was
rented from the Government by a one-eyed smith from Carthage. I
remember we called him Cyclops. He sold me a beaver-skin rug for my
sister's room.'

'But it couldn't have been here,' Dan insisted.

'But it was! From the Altar of Victory at Anderida to the First Forge
in the Forest here is twelve miles seven hundred paces. It is all in
the Road Book. A man doesn't forget his first march. I think I could
tell you every station between this a