“My good and stalwart Captain,” she said, coming near to me, “yonder sun, I fear, will never rise again on a Roman Briton! We must obey the Fates. You know what I would do, had I the power, to yonder scum; but, since we must desert this house to them (as I see too clearly we must), how can we best ensure the safety of the treasure?”
We arranged there and then, with small time for parley, that I should stay with a handful of her mercenaries and make a stand about the villa, while she, with the last of her servants, should go on and hurry up by every means in her power the slow caravan of her wealth. In truth, my mistress was as brave as she was overbearing, and but for those endless shining bags of gold, I do believe she would have stayed and fought the place with me.
As it was, she reluctantly consented to the plan, and bid me adieu (which I returned but coldly), and came back again for another kiss, and said another good-by, and hung about me, and enjoined caution, and held my hands, and looked first into my eyes and then back into the darkness where the laden mules were, as much in love as a rustic maid, as anxious as a usurer, and torn and distracted between these contending feelings.
At last she and all the women were gone, whereon with a lighter mind we set ourselves down to cover their retreat. Here must it be confessed that for myself I was ill at ease; treachery lurked within me. I had grown somewhat weary of her ladyship, nor had longer a special wish to be dragged in her golden chains, the restless spirit chance had bred within moved, and I had determined to see my enamored Vice-Prefect safe to her ships, and then—if I could—if I dared—break with her! I well knew the wild tornado of indignation and love this would call up, and hence had not confessed my intentions earlier, but had been cold and distant. The dame, you will see presently, had been sharper in guessing than I supposed.
We made such preparation as we could, with the small time at our disposal, barricading the white façade of the villa and closing all approaches. Then we pulled the winter stacks to pieces in the yard, making two great mounds of fagots in front of the porch, pouring oil upon each, and stationing a man to fire them, by way of torches, at a given signal. My hope was that, as the wide Roman way ran just below the villa, the avengers of the Ambassadors would not think of passing on until they had demolished the house and us.
Of the loyalty of the few men with me I had little fear. They were brave and stubborn, all their pay was on Electra’s mules, and the British hated them without compunction. There were in our little company that black evening, seven wild Welshmen, under a shaggy-haired, blue-eyed princeling: Gwallon of the Bow, he called himself—fifteen swarthy Iberians, all teeth and scimitar—a handful of Belgic mercenaries, with great double-headed axes—but never a Roman among them all in this last stand of Roman power in Britain!
Was I a Roman, I wondered, as I stood on the terrace, waiting the onset of the liberated slaves? What was I? Who was I? How came it that he who was first in repelling the stalwart Roman adventurers of endless years before was the last to lift a sword in their defense? And, more personally, was this night to be, as it greatly seemed, the last of all my wild adventures; or had fate infinite others in store for her bantling?
You will guess how I wondered and speculated as my golden Roman armor clanked to my gloomy stride in Electra’s empty corridors, and the wet, fleecy clouds drifted fitfully across the face of a broad, full moon, and a thousand things of love or sorrow crowded on my busy mind.
We had not long to wait, however. In an hour the mob came scuffling round the bend, shouting disorderly, with innumerable torches borne aloft, and they set up a yell when they caught sight of our shining white walls silently agleam in the moonlight.
There could be no parley with such a leaderless rush, and we attempted none. Without a thought of discipline they stormed the pastures and swarmed into the garden, a motley, angry crowd, armed with scythes and hooks and axes, and apparently all the town pressing on behind.