aps when I tell them the truth, when they see me return
without assistance, their courage may weaken and they may give up the
town to you. Let me pass through the lines, Hannibal; with this, it may
be that without desiring to do so, I shall forward your plans."

Hannibal looked at him in surprise.

"Madman! I never believed an Athenian capable of such a sacrifice. You
are such a light-hearted people, so given to perfidy, so false when you
wish to satisfy your egoism! You are the first Greek I ever found
faithful to the city which adopted him. Carthage had worse luck with the
mercenaries from your country! It is impossible to make anything of you;
you are only half a man! Love overmasters you; you are not satisfied as
I am with the woman who wanders around the camp, or whom one takes when
a city is assaulted and afterwards turns over to the soldiers. You bind
yourself to a woman, you become her slave, and you seek an inglorious
death in a dark corner of the world, like a mercenary in the service of
a handful of merchants, merely for the sake of seeing her again. Go,
madman, go! I give you your liberty--I wish to hear no more about you. I
was ready to make you a hero and you answer me like a slave. Go in to
Saguntum, but know that the protection of Hannibal abandons you from
this moment. If you fall into my hands inside the city you will be my
prisoner, never my friend!"

Digging his heels into his horse's ribs, Hannibal dashed into his camp,
contemptuously turning his back upon the Greek. In a moment a young
Carthaginian approached, who, without a word, nor even a glance at him,
grasped his bridle-reins and proceeded toward Saguntum.

As they gained the outposts of the besieging army the Carthaginian
pronounced a word and Actaeon passed on amid the hostile gaze of the
soldiers who had heard of the scene at the port, and were clamoring with
rage, thinking of the chains which the legates from Rome had the
insolence to show to their chief. That Greek who was about to enter the
besieged city must have been a companion of the legates, and many placed
an arrow in the bow to shoot at him, but were restrained by a cold and
haughty glance from the young Carthaginian who spoke in the name of
Hannibal.

They arrived at the ruins of the first walled quarter. The van of the
besieging army was within the shelter of the walls. The Greek
dismounted, and breaking a thorny branch from a bush he walked on,
holding it aloft as a signal