"Speak," ordered Thorismuth.
"I got to the pine-wood before Regium without seeing anything suspicious, but also without meeting with a soul upon the way. As, looking eagerly forward, I rode past a thick tree, I felt a pull at my neck as if my head would be torn from my shoulders, and the next minute I lay on the road under my horse."
"Badly sat, Gelaris," scolded Thorismuth.
"Oh yes, of course! A noose of horse-hair round his neck, and an arrow whistling past his head, and a better rider would fall than Gelaris, son of Genzo! Two demons--wood-devils or goblins they seemed to me--rushed out of the bushes and over the ditch, tied me upon my horse, took me between their little shaggy ponies, and ho!----"
"Those are Belisarius's Huns!" cried Valerius.
"Away they went with me. When I came to myself again, I was in Regium in the midst of the enemy, and there I learned everything. The Queen-regent is murdered, war is declared, the enemy has taken Sicily by surprise, the whole island has gone over to the Emperor----"
"And the fortress, Panormus?"
"Was taken by the fleet, which made its way into the harbour. The mast-heads were higher than the walls of the town. From thence they shot their arrows, and jumped on to the walls."
"And Syracusæ?" asked Valerius.
"Fell through the treachery of the Sicilians; the Gothic garrison is murdered. Belisarius rode into Syracusæ amidst a shower of flowers, and--for it was the last days of his consulate--threw gold coins about him, amidst the applause of the population."