"Simple. You remember that little device I had on the wheel of that wagon? That measures distance. I measured the distances along the road. Knowing their normal day's march and the point they started from, the rest was easy."
"Tsk, tsk, wonderful. How do you think of all those things?" Liuderis' big, trustful eyes reminded Padway of those of a St. Bernard. "Shall I have the engineers set up Brunhilde now?"
"Not yet. When the sun sets we'll measure the distance to the camp."
"How will you do that without being seen?"
"I'll show you when the time comes. Meanwhile make sure that the boys keep quiet and out of sight."
Liuderis frowned. "They will not like having to eat a cold supper. If we do not watch them, somebody will surely start a fire."
Padway sighed. He'd had plenty of sad experience with the temperamental and undisciplined Goths. One minute they were as excited as small boys over the plans of Mysterious Martinus, as they called him; the next day they were growling on the edge of mutiny about the enforcement of some petty regulation. Since Padway felt that it wouldn't do for him to order them around directly, poor Liuderis had to take it.
The Byzantines set up their camp with orderly promptitude. Those, Padway thought, were real soldiers. You could accomplish something with men like that to command. It would be a long time before the Goths attained such a smooth perfection of movement. The Goths were still obsessed with childish, slam-bang ideas of warfare.
Witness the grumbling that had greeted Padway's requisition of a squad for engineers. Running catapults was a sissy job, inconsistent with knightly honor. And well-born lancers fight on foot like a lot or serfs? Perish the thought! Padway had seduced them away from their beloved horses by an ingenious method: He, or rather Liuderis at his suggestion, formed a company of pikemen, loudly announcing that only the best men would be admitted, and that furthermore candidates would be made to pay for admission. Padway explained that there was no type of troop wherein morale and discipline were as vital as in heavy infantry, because one man flinching from a cavalry charge might break the line of spears and let the enemy in.
It was getting too dark for his telescope to be useful. He could make out the general's standard in front of a big tent. Perhaps Belisarius was one of those little figures around it. If he had a machine-gun—but he didn't have, and never would. You needed machines to make a machine-gun, and machines to make those machines, and so on. If he ever got a workable muzzle-loading musket he'd be doing well.