"Take him!" Classicus cried.
The two servants sprang forward, but Marsyas, seizing Classicus by the hair, thrust his head back and put the point of the knife at his throat.
The two halted, tautly drawn up as if the point of the blade touched their own flesh. Instinctively they knew that the silky quiet in the voice was deadly; Marsyas had them.
Meanwhile the galley was delivering up her passengers to the land. The first ship's boat that touched the landing carried four patricians. The soft sound of heelless sandals on the pavement drifted down from Babe. Some one of the citizens was coming to meet the arrivals.
The four stepped out, and the ship's boat shot back into the darkness.
"Ho! Regulus," one of the four cried.
"Coming!" the citizen answered from the street. "What news?"
"Cæsar is dead!"
Classicus relaxed in Marsyas' grip; the slaves stood transfixed; the young Essene, holding fast, stilled his loud heart and listened.
"Old age?" the citizen ventured.