“How is that?”
The prince put his trembling hand to his brow and in his agitation knocked off his hat.
The freedman picked it up.
“The customary manner, sire! your neck will be put in the cleft of a forked stick and you will be beaten, lashed, kicked to death. Better take the sword and fall on it.”
“Oh, Phaon! not yet! I cannot endure pain. I have a spring nail now—and it hurts! it hurts!”
“Ride on, my lord; at the cypress hedge we will turn our horses loose, and by a path through the fields reach my villa.”
Half an hour after Nero had left the Servilian palace, where now stands the Lateran, Lamia arrived followed by two servants. He found the secretary in a heap at the door, vainly writhing in his knotted chains. Lamia at once asked him about the prince, whether he was there.
“I will both answer and show you whither he is fled,” said Epaphroditus, “if you will release me. Otherwise my tongue is tied like my limbs.”
“Is he here?”
“Nay, he has been here, but is gone. Whither I alone can say. The price of the information is release.”