“Well, Lucius,” said Uncle Catullus, embracing him, “you’re looking splendid, my dear fellow, splendid, brown and bronzed as a Nimrod; and your arms feel hard and your eyes are bright and your mouth is laughing happily and you look very different from what you were when we left Baiæ.... Ah, my dear, dear Lucius! Fortune is blind and fate is a riddle and we poor mortals are the playthings of the cruel gods; and we never know, in the midst of our delight and gladness, what is hanging over our heads ... especially when travelling, dear boy: my dear boy, especially when travelling!”
“But why especially when travelling, my dear uncle?” asked Lucius, laughing.
And he led his uncle into the diversorium; and his uncle was now weeping; and his slaves unpinned his travelling-veil for him and relieved him of his travelling-cloak; and Vettius and Rufus also looked so strange and so gloomy and solemn; and it was as though the air were filled with dread.
“But, Uncle Catullus,” said Lucius, “what has happened?”
“My dear, dear boy,” Uncle Catullus kept on tediously repeating, “I ... I really can not tell you.”
And he wrung his hands and wept; and Thrasyllus turned pale and Cora turned pale and Rufus looked gloomy.
“No,” repeated Uncle Catullus, “I really can not tell Lucius. You tell him, Vettius, you tell him.”
“My Lord Catullus,” said Vettius, at last, in despair, “how can I tell my Lord Lucius? If I do, he will fly into a passion and kill me; but, perhaps, if Rufus will tell him ...”
“I will not, I will not,” said Rufus, warding off the suggestion with both hands. “By all the gods, Vettius, I will not tell him.”
“Nor will I,” said Uncle Catullus, moaning and weeping.