At last Hortensius Martius had reached the foot of the steps. The massive iron gates stood alone between him and the black panther, which cowered some twenty feet away behind a low monticule covered with tufts of grass, its tiny eyes of topaz fixed upon the oncoming prey.
Hortensius gave the order for the opening of the gates. They swung upon their hinges and he passed out through them. And they fell to behind him with a mighty clang.
Thunderous applause greeted him when he set his foot upon the sands of the arena. The panther did not move. It had even ceased to snarl, but its sinewy tail beat a dull tattoo upon the ground.
Then over the whole arena there rose a curious sound, like the sighing of two hundred thousand souls, an indrawing of the breath in two hundred thousand throats. Hortensius Martius looked up, for the sigh had sounded very strangely in his ear, and it had been followed by a still stranger silence, as if two hundred thousand hearts had momentarily ceased to beat.
And as he looked he understood the sigh, and also the death-like silence that followed.
He saw that from the niches all round the arena the safety ladders of crimson silk had all been taken away.
And up in the imperial tribune the mighty Cæsar laughed loudly and long.