pare form and thin
face of the man with the laurel crown.

[Illustration: They leapt in and disappeared.]

Twelve thousand swords flashed in air and wavered a little like reeds in
the breeze, then steadied themselves, and the shout went up from twelve
thousand throats:

'Ave Caesar!'

And without haste and without delay the Romans filed through the ruins
to the marble-covered book, and two by two entered it and disappeared.
Each as he passed the mighty conqueror saluted him with proud mute
reverence.

When the last soldier was hidden in the book, Caesar looked round him, a
little wistfully.

'I must speak to him; I must,' Lucy cried; 'I _must_. Oh, what a darling
he is!'

She ran down the steps from the gallery and straight to Caesar. He
smiled when she reached him, and gently pinched her ear. Fancy going
through the rest of your life hearing all the voices of the world
through an ear that has been pinched by Caesar!

'Oh, thank you! thank you!' said Philip; 'how splendid you are. I'll
swot up my Latin like anything next term, so as to read about you.'

'Are they all in?' Lucy asked. 'I do hope nobody was hurt.'

Caesar smiled.

'A most unreasonable wish, my child, after a great battle!' he said.
'But for once the unreasonable is the inevitable. Nobody was hurt. You
see it was necessary to get every man back into the book just as he left
it, or what would the schoolmasters have done? There remain now only my
own guard who have in charge the false woman who let loose the
barbarians. And here they come.'

Surrounded by a guard with drawn swords the Pretenderette advanced
slowly.

'Hail, woman!' said Caesar.

'Hail, whoever you are!' said the Pretenderette very sulkily.

'I hail,' said Caesar, 'your courage.'

Philip and Lucy looked at each other. Yes, the Pretenderette had
courage: they had not thought of that before. All the attempts she had
made against them--she alone in a strange land--yes, these needed
courage.

'And I demand to know how you came here?'

'When I found he'd been at his building again,' she said, pointing a
contemptuous thumb at Philip, 'I was just going to pull it down, and I
knocked down a brick or two with my sleeve, and not thinking what I was
doing I built them up again; and then I got a bit giddy and the whole
thing seemed to begin to grow--candlesticks and bricks and dominoes and
everything, bigger and bigger and bigger, and I looked in. It was as big
as a church by thi