mptied it down his throat instead.
"It is thirsty work, this fighting," he said, "and that drink comes very
useful."

I put my hand on his blood-smeared arm. "Tob," I said, "whether I step
into power again, or whether I go to the block to-morrow, is another
matter which the Gods alone know, but hear me tell you now, that if a
chance is given me of showing my gratitude, I shall not forget the way
you have served me in this voyage, and the way you have fought this
day."

Tob filled another brimming horn from the wine-skin and splashed it at
my feet. "That's good enough surety for me," he said, "that my woman and
brats never want from this day onward. The Lord Deucalion for the block,
indeed!"

4. THE WELCOME OF PHORENICE

Now I can say it with all truth that, till the rival navy met us in the
mouth of the gulf, I had thought little enough of my importance as a
recruit for the Empress. But the laying in wait for us of those ships,
and the wild ferocity with which they fought so that I might fall into
their hands, were omens which the blindest could not fail to read. It
was clear that I was expected to play a lusty part in the fortunes of
the nation.

But if our coming had been watched for by enemies it seemed that
Phorenice also had her scouts; and these saw us from the mountains, and
carried news to the capital. The arm of the sea at the head of which the
vast city of Atlantis stands, varies greatly in width. In places where
the mountains have over-boiled, and sent their liquid contents down to
form hard stone below, the channel has barely a river's wideness, and
then beyond, for the next half-day's sail it will widen out into a lake,
with the sides barely visible. Moreover, its course is winding, and so
a runner who knows his way across the flats, and the swamps, and between
the smoking hills which lie along the shore, and did not get overcome by
fire-streams, or water, or wandering beasts, could carry news overland
from seacoast to capital far speedier than even the most shrewdly
whipped of galleys could ferry it along the water.

Of course there were heavy risks that a lone traveller would not make
a safe passage by this land route, if he were bidden to sacrifice all
precautions to speed. But Phorenice was no niggard with her couriers.
She sent a corps of twenty to the headland that overlooks the
sea-entrance to the straits; they started with the news, each on his own
route; and it says much for their s