He guided me in the utter blackness to a pile of damp straw. On it we sat down, half reclining.
"If you are thirsty," he said, "I can guide you to the well. There is a spring in here and plenty of good water."
"I thank you," I said. "I shall be thirsty enough before long. Just now I am far more interested to hear how you came here. Nobody believed that you would ever be caught."
"No more did I!" he ejaculated. "I had so easily defied the utmost efforts of the government and officials under Aurelius, of the incompetents under Commodus, of his vaunted Highway Constabulary; had so prospered, had so come and gone as I pleased and robbed whom I pleased from the Po to the Straits, that I thought no man could lay for me any snare I could not foresee, thought myself impeccably wary and prescient, though I had always taken and would always take all necessary precautions.
"But I was a fool. I comprehended Aurelius and Commodus and their magistrates and officials and constabulary; I was right in fearing nothing from Pertinax and Julianus; but I was an ass to think I could cope with Septimius Severus. That man is deeper than the deepest abyss of mid-ocean!
"I thought I was certain of months of disorder, confusion and laxity in which I could go where I pleased, act as I pleased, garner a rich harvest and escape unscathed. Do you know, before he had left Aquileia, perhaps before he had passed the Alps, possibly before he had set out from Sabaria, that man had despatched not one but a dozen detachments to ascertain my whereabouts, consider how best to take me unawares, lie in wait for me, nab me and hunt down my bands. I believe he had thought out, far back in that head of his, long before Pertinax was murdered, perhaps even long before Commodus died, every measure he would initiate if he became Emperor, down to the smallest detail. He had all his plans framed and thought out, I'll wager!
"His emissaries were no fools! They, first among those despatched against me, knew their business. I was trapped near Sentinum, on the Kalends of this month. Never mind how; even in this plight I'm ashamed of it. They just missed nabbing Felix Bulla along with me. But he got away that time. And I prophesy that now he is warned of his danger and knows the cleverness of the men on his trail, he'll show himself yet cleverer. He is a marvel, is Felix Bulla, and promises to outdo even my record."
He broke off, breathing audibly.
"By the way," he went on, "are you hungry? I have part of a loaf of bread in here, not yet stale and no damper than it must get in this foul air. It hasn't fallen on the floor. It's eatable."
"I'll be hungry enough before long," I replied, "but I am not hungry now.
I had eaten all I wanted and of the best just before I was haled here."