I recognized Vedia's handwriting. I trusted her implicitly. I was far more elated at her concern for me than I was depressed at my impending ruin. Somehow the fact that she had taken the trouble not only to warn me, but to think out for me all the details of a plan of at least temporary escape, the inference that she hoped, hoped against hope, that I might be somehow saved, heartened me amazingly; so that I was rather inspirited at the prospect of adventure than daunted by the shadow of inescapable doom. I gathered myself together, determined to take as much advantage as possible of Vedia's warning, and of the respite it afforded me. I resolved to follow her suggestions. I had set out for the Palace unusually early. I had plenty of time. I ordered my bearers to carry me through the heart of the City down the whole length of the Vicus Tuscus to the meat market.
I should, I suppose, have been in an agony of vain regrets; I rather expected from moment to moment to be drowned in an inundation of such sensations, I was more than a little surprised at my actual feelings. Here I was, hitherto a wealthy Roman nobleman in excellent standing with my fellows, my superiors and the Prince; from now on a hunted fugitive and not likely to postpone my last hour more than a few days. I was, presumably, viewing the throbbing heart of glorious Rome for the last time. I should have felt chief mourner at my own funeral. Actually I relished, I hugely enjoyed, every pace of my progress through the filling streets, where the passers-by and idlers were still fresh, and lively after a night's sleep and where everything was irradiated by cheerful morning sunlight. I felt cheerful as the sunlight.
Beyond the Meat Market I had my bearers stop at the Temple of Fortune, which I entered, there I prayed fervently before the statue of the Goddess.
When I was again out in the market I bought two live white hens, young and plump, and assigned one of my relief-bearers to carry carefully the basket in which the old market-woman ensconced them, after I had paid her well for her basket as well as her hens.
Then I had my men carry me down the straight empty street along the southwest flank of the Circus Maximus. Half way along it I halted them before the Temple of Mercury. This I entered and, bidding one of the attendants lead me to the priest in charge at that hour, I requested him to offer for me the two white hens and beseech for me the favor of the God.
Outside I reëntered my litter and made my bearers trot all the way round by the big and little Coelian Hills to the Querquetulan Gate. We passed on this route many cheap shops. From one I bought a pair of horseman's high boots, soft and supple and mud-proof. All the way I enjoyed hugely my outing and the sights and sounds around me. From another shop one of my reliefs brought me an umbrella hat which fitted me and a voluminous horseman's raincloak which could not but protect anybody; at another I had bought for me a wallet; at another flint and steel in a good horn case, compact and neat.
Outside the Querquetulan Gate, which my bearers reached blown and sweating, although the reliefs had changed at short intervals, we had no difficulty in locating Plosurnia's tavern. The holder of the bay horse with the blue and silver trappings recognized my pass-words and surrendered his charge to one of my extra bearers. At the tavern another lined my wallet with bread, sausages, olives, dried figs and cheese, while I was changing into horseman's kit.
I put into the wallet my money, more than enough cash for my journey home, and Vedia's letter. I then mounted, gave my boys their orders and set off at an easy canter. I knew I must show no signs of haste until I was on the Highroad, so I took my time about working round to it. Once on the Via Tiburtina, where horsemen at a tearing gallop, going in either direction, were too common a sight to cause any remarks, I let out my mettlesome mount and covered the remainder of the twenty-four miles to Tibur not long before noon.
Between the bridge over the Anio and Tibur are a number of hilltops, from each of which one has a fine view of Rome, if the weather is clear and bright. The weather was very bright and clear and the views very fine. At each hilltop I checked my mount, wheeled him and remained so for sometime, contemplating the magnificence I might never see again, the glory upon which my gaze, most likely, would never again feast. I should have felt my eyes fill with tears at each of these prospects, the viewing of which was, each time, in the nature of a last farewell. Yet, somehow, most irrationally, I felt anything but dejected, rather hopeful and full of conjectures about my future, instead of being filled with forebodings of doom, with sorrow for my hard fate.