se in another minute the life would be battered out of him. He
struggled to his knees.

"Prince," he cried, "hearken ere you strike. You can kill me if you will
who are justly angered, and to die at your hands is an honour that I do
not merit. Yet, dread lord, remember that if you slay me then you will
never find that Pearl-Maiden whom you desire."

Domitian paused, for even in his fury he was cunning. "Doubtless," he
thought, "the knave knows where the girl is. Perhaps even he has hidden
her away for himself."

"Ah!" he said aloud, quoting the vulgar proverb, "'the rod is the mother
of reason.' Well, can you find her?"

"Surely, if I have time. The man who can afford to pay two thousand
sestertia for a single slave cannot easily be hidden."

"Two thousand sestertia!" exclaimed Domitian astonished. "Tell me that
story. Slaves, give Saturius his robe and fall back--no, not too far, he
may be treacherous."

The chamberlain threw the garment over his bleeding shoulders and
fastened it with a trembling hand. Then he told his tale, adding:

"Oh! my lord, what could I do? You have not enough money at hand to pay
so huge a sum."

"Do, fool? Why you should have bought her on credit and left me
to settle the price afterwards. Oh! never mind Titus, I could have
outwitted him. But the mischief is done; now for the remedy, so far as
it can be remedied," he added, grinding his teeth.

"That I must seek to-morrow, lord."

"To-morrow? And what will you do to-morrow?"

"To-morrow I will find where the girl's gone, or try to, and then--why
he who has bought her might die and--the rest will be easy."

"Die he surely shall be who has dared to rob Domitian of his darling,"
answered the prince with an oath. "Well, hearken, Saturius, for this
night you are spared, but be sure that if you fail for the second time
you also shall die, and after a worse fashion than I promised you. Now
go, and to-morrow we will take counsel. Oh! ye gods, why do you deal
so hardly with Domitian? My soul is bruised and must be comforted with
poesy. Rouse that Greek from his bed and send him to me. He shall read
to me of the wrath of Achilles when they robbed him of his Briseis, for
the hero's lot is mine."

So this new Achilles departed, now that his rage had left him, weeping
maudlin tears of disappointed passion, to comfort his "bruised soul"
with the immortal lines of Homer, for when he was not merely a brute
Domitian fancied himself a poet. It