Narcissus had wheeled the chariot in a short circle and halted it as near Palus as he could keep it and control the frantic horse. Palus took from one of the hand-holds at the back of the chariot-rail a long leathern thong. With his dirk he slit each foot of the corpse between the leg-bone and the heel-tendon; through the slit he passed the thong, knotting it to his liking. The doubled thong he tied securely to the rear rim of the chariot-bed. Retrieving his lance and shield he posed an instant, every inch Achilles, stepped over Hector's naked corpse and mounted the chariot. From Automedon he took the reins and the whip, passing him his lance, yet retaining his great circular shield, nowise hampered by which he drove the chariot round and round the pyre, the picture, as all could see, he felt, of Achilles placating the ghost of Patroclus.
This exhibition shocked the whole audience, upper tiers and all. The ghost of a hiss breathed under the tense hush of the silent beholders. A shudder ran over the hollow of the amphitheater, as the dragged corpse, mauled by the sand and turning over, became a mere lump of pounded meat. The chill of the onlookers appeared to reach Palus. He halted his team near the pyre, arena-slaves dragged away Hector's corpse, one brought a lighted torch and Palus himself kindled the pyre at each of its four corners, walking twice round it. When it was enveloped in crackling flames, he mounted the chariot and Narcissus drove him out; drove him out, to the horror of all beholders by the Gate of Ill-omen.
After he vanished through that gate no amphitheater ever again beheld
Palus the Gladiator.
When he was gone all eyes were fixed on the kindling pyre. The flames blazed up all round it and above it, the smoke mounted skyward in a thick column, the crackle and roar of the flames was audible all over the amphitheater; so deep was the solemn stillness. I shall carry to my last living hour the vivid recollection of that picture: under the grim gray sky, framed in by the sable hangings which draped the upper colonnade, and by the clingy audience, against the yellow sand, that column of sooty smoke and below it the red glare of the blazing pyre.
CHAPTER XXXVI
ANXIETY
After my seclusion at Baiae, up to the terrible events which I am about to narrate, by far the most important of my experiences had been my personal observations of the fights of Palus the Gladiator and what I had heard and thought about him. Therefore I have narrated those at length and first. Now I approach the story of my most dreadful miseries.
From my return to Rome my life had gone on much as it had before my master had compelled me to impersonate Salsonius Salinator and, in so doing, to resume my natural appearance as I had looked while my genuine self, and thus, undisguised, to mingle with the associates of my normal early life. After my hair and beard had regained their previous luxuriance and I was again painted, rouged, frizzed, bejeweled, and bedizened, I felt safe and, was in fact, almost entirely safe. In this guise I enjoyed life. Falco was indulgent to me and I had every luxury at my command.
Falco's mania for gem-collecting did not wane, but, if possible, grew on him. His ventures all prospered, his profits from risky speculations poured in, his normal income from his heritage increased; and, of all this opulence, every surplus denarius was paid out for gems and curios. Yet he never was so much a faddist as to lose a day from the games of the circus and the amphitheater. He viewed every show of gladiators, every day of racing, almost every combat and every race.
The day after the spectacular games for Murmex and his more spectacular cremation, the eighth day before the Kalends of January, was nominally the last racing day of the year. The weather was fair and mild. The Circus Maximus was crowded, the Imperial Pavilion blazed with the retinue about the Emperor, he and all of us enjoyed the thirty races of four four-horsed chariots to each. I mention this because it was his last public appearance.