'"You have seen it," said Maximus. "I shall never need your son any more. He will live and he will die an officer of a Legion—and he might have been Prefect of one of my Provinces. Now eat and drink with us," he said. "Your men will wait till you have finished."
'My miserable thirty stood like wine-skins glistening in the hot sun, and Maximus led us to where his people had set a meal. Himself he mixed the wine.
'"A year from now," he said, "you will remember that you have sat with the Emperor of Britain—and Gaul."
'"Yes," said the Pater, "you can drive two mules—Gaul and Britain."
'"Five years hence you will remember that you have drunk"—he passed me the cup and there was blue borage in it—"with the Emperor of Rome!"
'"No; you can't drive three mules. They will tear you in pieces," said my Father.
'"And you on the Wall, among the heather, will weep because your notion of justice was more to you than the favour of the Emperor of Rome."
'I sat quite still. One does not answer a General who wears the Purple.
'"I am not angry with you," he went on; "I owe too much to your Father——"