HIDING
It was fully dark before we dared to leave our hiding-place and attempt
the risky venture of essaying to reach a safer shelter or refuge in the
forests without attracting the attention of any dog at any of the several
farmsteads which we must pass.
Agathemer led and I followed, my teeth chattering and the night insects
biting me severely. Hugging our precious copper cylinders we waded more
than waistdeep in the water, up the Bran Brook, sometimes all but
swimming, as we skirted some of the deeper pools. There was no moon and we
could see but little by the faint starlight. We had to go slowly, as we
could not swim and keep hold of our cylinders; and must not risk losing
one if Agathemer went over his head in a deep pool. It seemed to me that
we had been threading the curves of the brook for at least two hours when
I began to feel as if something were wrong. Even in the dark I had been
aware of a sort of recognition of each pool, shallow, riffle, bend, bank
or what not. Now, gradually, it came over me that I was among surroundings
as unfamiliar as if I had not been in Sabinum, or even in Italy.
I caught Agathemer by the arm.
"Where are we?" I whispered.
"Don't talk!" he warned.
But I insisted; for, as we were by now no more than knee-deep in the
water, I knew we must be well up towards the headwaters and it came over
me that we had not turned off anywhere as sharply as we should had we
turned up either the Chaff or the Flour.
"Are we going up the Bran?" I queried.
"Precisely!" Agathemer breathed.
I almost spoke out loud.
"This," I said, "is the last place on earth I'd expect you to guide me
to."
"Precisely," he repeated, "and it's the last place on earth anybody else
would expect me to lead you to or you to be in, by any chance; therefore
it's the last place in Italy where any one will look for you; therefore it
is, just now, the safest place in Italy for you. Come on, I know every
stone of this brook."
I followed him. His logic was good, but, on Ducconius Furfur's land I felt
hopelessly lost and overwhelmed by despair.
We had not gone far from where I had forced Agathemer to reveal his ruse,
when he turned round and whispered:
"This is the place. Here we leave the water. Follow me."
I was dimly aware of a blacker blackness before us, as of a big, tall
rock. This we skirted and then stepped out of the brook towards the left.
There we stepped into deep drifts of dead leaves.
"Here is bedding," said Agathemer, "such as Ulysses was content with after
his long sea-swim to the island of the Phaeacians. Perhaps we can get
along in such bedding."
Naked as we were we burrowed into the dead leaves, and, after a bit I felt
less chilly, though by no means warm.
Agathemer took from me the cylinder I had been carrying; opened one of the
two, a matter of some difficulty, as the top was so tight; sniffed at it,
and took from it some morsels of food: a bit of cold ham, a bit of cold
fowl and a bit of bread. These I ate, chewing them slowly. At the same
time he ate, as slowly, an equal share.
After eating we tried to sleep. I was too weary and drowsy to keep awake,
and too cold and too much in pain from the scratch on my shoulder and the
gouge on my hip to be able to sleep long. I got some sleep before dawn,
but not much.
Fortunately for us the night had been clear, warm and windless. Even so we
suffered severely with the cold; since the chilled air, of course, rolled
down the hillsides into the hollow along the bed of the brook, till the
valley was filled with thick mist and every leaf and twig dripped with
moisture. Through the mist the dawn broke pearly gray at first and then
iridescent; and, when the first sunrays penetrated the white haze and
gilded every leaf-edge, turning the tree-tops to gold and making every
waterdrop a diamond, no lovelier morning could be imagined.
The trees about and above us were mostly beeches, with many chestnuts and
a few plane-trees and poplars. We were in a clump of willows with thick
alders under them, so that, even with no other protection, we could not
have been seen from any distance. And we were most excellently protected,
being on a little island where the brook forked and flowed, three or four
yards wide and nearly a yard deep, round a huge gray rock, fully fifteen
yards across and nearly seven yards high, a bulge of worn stone, shaped
much like half a melon and almost as symmetrical. And, as one might lay
half a melon, curve up, and then split it with one blow of a kitchen-
knife, so this great rock, as if cleft by a single sweep of a Titan's
sword, was rent in half and the halves left about four yards apart. The
fracture was clean and smooth, except that a piece about two yards square
had cracked loose at the ground level from the southern half and lay
bedded in the mud, its top a foot or so above the earth, leaving in the
face of one rock a rectangular niche about a man's length each way, in
which cavity two men could shelter from the rain.
As soon as it was light enough to see I was for crawling into this little
cavern. But Agathemer restrained me.
"The face of the rock," he said, "would feel cold as ice to your skin. You
have, even if you do not realize it, somewhat warmed the leaves next you.
For the present we are least uncomfortable where we are. The dawn-wind
cannot get at our hides while we are under these leaves. Keep still."
He kept himself as much as possible under the leaves but wriggled nearer
the altar-shaped bit of rock. Half-sitting, half crouching by it, little
besides his head out of the heap of leaves in which he was, he opened both
cylinders and laid out on the top of the stone what food was in them. This
he divided into six equal portions, two he put back in each cylinder. We
munched interminably, making every morsel last as long as possible.
The food revived me, and even before the dawn-wind had died, the rays of
the sun began to make themselves felt. I began to be restless; Agathemer
again checked me.
"Keep still," he commanded. "As soon as the sun has dried the dew off the
leaves I can make you more comfortable. Just now we are best as we are."
I kept under the leaves, but I peered about. At each end of the cleft
between the two halves of the rock I could see the brook brawling by among
the worn stones. The line of the cleft was directly across the bed of the
brook; and, along the cleft, past the detached, almost buried, altar-
shaped stone, I descried, barely discernible but unmistakable, such a path
as is made by the bare or sandalled feet of even one human being following
daily the same track. I conned it. I judged that it was many, many decades
old and had been trodden daily for a lifetime or so, but that it had been
totally disused for at least a year and possibly for more.
I pointed it out to Agathemer and asked him about it.
"That," he said, "is part of what used to be the shorter and more used of
the two paths from Furfur's villa to Philargyrus's farmstead. Naturally,
since the Philargyrus farm has been detached from Furfur's estate and has
become part of yours, there must be very little intercommunication between
the farm and the villa and I judged that any slave going from one to the
other would avoid the more obvious path and sneak round the longer way.
Therefore I judged it safer to locate here, as this path is probably
totally unused."
"How did you know of it?" I queried.
Up to his neck in leaves, arms under too, only his head out, Agathemer
blushed all over his handsome face.
"Before Andivius won the suit," he said, "while Philargyrus was still
Furfur's tenant, I had an impassioned love-affair with one of Furfur's
slave-girls. We used to meet here, at first on moonlit nights, and, later,
when we each knew every inch of our way here and home again, more often on
moonless nights. I always waded up and down the bed of the brook, so as to
leave no scent for any dog to follow. I know this nook well and thought of
it the instant I began to plan an escape for you."
I said nothing.
"It is barely possible," he said, "that some one may use this path, even
if no one has passed along it for months. That is just the way luck turns
out. I mean to be invisible if anyone does come. There was no likelihood
of anyone coming by at dawn, and no possibility of doing anything if
anyone did come. Now it is warm enough for me to pick off the outer layer
of dew-wet leaves from whatever heaps of dead leaves are hereabouts. I can
gather the dry leaves into that little grotto. We can lie on a bed of
them, wrapped up in them we can cower under them, we can even pull our
heads under and be invisible if we hear footsteps approaching. You keep
still."
He then stood up and went off. After a time he returned with a great
armful of leaves, which he threw into the niche. After many trips he had
the niche almost full of fairly dry dead leaves. By this time the warmth
of the sun was making itself felt and I stood up and stretched myself. I
did not feel weak, but my shoulder and hip, where the drain-pipe had torn
me, and the sole of my foot, where Agathemer had bitten me, were decidedly
painful. Agathemer, solicitously, steadied me on my feet and led me to the
streamside. There I seated myself on a convenient rock and he bathed my
foot, hip and shoulder. There was no sign of puffiness or heat in any of
the three wounds, but all three were raw and sore. We had nothing with
which to dress them and Agathemer merely dried them as well as he could by
patting them.
Meanwhile, even in my misery and despair, even hungry, weak and cold and
in pain as I was, I could not but feel a gleam of pleasure at the
enchanting beauty of the woodland scene about our hiding place. I gazed up
at the bits of blue sky between the sunlit boughs, at the canopy of green,
at the tenderer green of the underwood, at the carpet of grass, ferns,
sedges and flowering plants which hid the earth and I almost rejoiced at
its loveliness.
Agathemer led me back to our retreat and ensconced me in the nook of rock,
on a soft deep bed of dry dead leaves, under a coverlet of more. Into the
heaps he burrowed. The warmth of his naked body warmed me a trifle. There
we lay still till dark. I slept, I think, from about noon till after
sunset.
While we could still see, Agathemer, making me keep flat as I was,
wriggled out of the leaves and pushed them aside from my head and face. We
then ate half our remaining food. As it grew dark Agathemer expounded to
me his plans.
"Last night," he said, "there was no sense in doing anything. Hiding and
keeping out of sight was the best thing we could do. But tonight I must
try to steal what we need most. The risk must be taken. If I do not return
you will know I have done my best. But I feel confident of returning
before midnight. I know every farmstead on Furfur's estate and all the
dogs know me. On your estate I not only know the dogs, but I have just
finished an inspection and I know the location of every dairy, smoke-
house, larder and oven, I might almost say of every loaf, cheese, ham,
flitch, wine-vat and oil-jar on the estate, not to mention every store-
room where I might get us hats, tunics, sandals, quilts and what not.
"If I cannot do it otherwise, as a last resort I'll wake Uturia and tell
her of our situation; she will help and will be secret. But I'll not
resort to her if I can help it. Her most willing secrecy will not be as
safe as her ignorance of our fate. No torture could surmount that."
I wanted to say "Farewell," but restrained myself and uttered a not too
gloomy:
"Good luck and a prosperous return!"
After that, I lay and quaked till long past midnight. Then, I seemed to
hear sounds which I could but interpret as heralding Agathemer's approach.
In fact he soon spoke to me from close by and I heard the unmistakable
blurred noise made by a soft and yet heavy pack deposited on the ground by
my bed of leaves.
"I've nearly everything I wanted," said Agathemer. "Keep still while I
untie the quilt I carried it all in, and find things in the dark."
Presently he said:
"Stand up, and I'll try to dress you."
In the dark his hand found my hand and he guided me so that I extricated
myself from the heap of leaves without hitting my head on the jutting roof
of rock and without slipping on the wet earth or stumbling from weakness.
In the dark he slipped over my head a coarse, patched tunic. (I could feel
against my skin the rude stitching of the patches.) Then he wrapped about
me a coarse cloak, also much patched.
"Now," he said, "stand where you are till I make some sort of a bed for
you."
He fumbled about in the dark, grunting and making, I thought, too much
rustling in the leaves. Presently he said:
"I've laid a doubled quilt on the leaves and packed them down. Give me
your hand and I'll arrange you on it. Then I'll cover you with another
quilt."
He did, deftly and solicitously.
I began to feel warm for the first time since I had sunk into the ooze of
the drain-trap.
Agathemer fumbled about in the dark for a while and then came near again
and felt me, making sure where my head was. He made me sit up.
"Smell that!" he said, "and catch hold of it."
I smelt ewe's-milk cheese and my fingers closed on a generous piece of it.
Then, he put into my other hand a big chunk of bread, not yet entirely
cold.
I bit the bread. It was Ofatulena's unsurpassable farm bread, half wheat
flour and half barley flour and at that more appetizing and flavorsome
than any wheat-bread I ever tasted.
"There is plenty for both of us," Agathemer said, "eat all you want, but
eat slow and be careful not to bolt a morsel."
He sat down by me and we munched in silence.
By and by he asked:
"Do you want any more?"
"No," I answered, "you judged my capacity pretty well. I am filled up."
"Don't lie down," he said, "I have a small kid-skin of wine."
We laughed a good deal before he made sure precisely where my mouth was
and put into it the reed which projected from one leg of the kid-skin. I
drank in abundance of a thin, sour wine, such as we kept for the slaves.
It gave me new life.
After that draught of wine I composed myself to sleep and went to sleep at
once. I knew nothing of Agathemer's doings after that and did not feel him
when he lay down by me. I slept till broad daylight.
When I waked Agathemer gave me a moderate draught of wine and all the
bread and cheese I chose to eat: also a handful of olives. Then he
displayed the total of his plunder: hats, with brims neither too broad nor
too narrow, the best pattern if one was to have only one hat, worn and
battered enough to suit us as being inconspicuous, yet nowhere torn,
broken or slit; a tunic and cloak apiece, about the oldest and most
patched in my villa-farm storage-loft, such as Ofatulena would hand out to
newly bought and untried slaves; three quilts, as bad as the cloaks and
tunics, yet, like them, fairly serviceable and far from worn out; the kid-
skin of wine, a whole loaf of bread and the remains of the one we had been
eating, what was left of a cheese and another whole; a little, tall,
narrow jar of olive oil; a small bag of olives; a tiny box full of salt,
the box of beechwood and about the size of a man's three fingers; a
whetstone, a pair of rusty scissors; two small beechwood cups; a little
copper dipper; some rags, old and worn, but perfectly clean; and a
flageolet!
"In the name of Dionysius!" I cried laughing, "why the flageolet?"
Agathemer laughed also.
"My hand," he said, "came on it in the dark while feeling for the
scissors. I could not resist bringing it. It is small, it weighs little,
it will not add to our burdens and, once far away from here, I can play on
it when we are lonely and so cheer us up."
"You appear," I said, "to have been able to help yourself as you pleased."
"No more trouble," said he, "than if I had walked out of the villa night
before last and poked about the out-buildings to see whether everything
was as when I inspected them by day; only three dogs barked, and they
quieted down almost immediately. I am sure I roused no one and am ready to
wager that every slave was as sound asleep as if I had not been there."
I lazily readjusted myself on my quilt and leaf mattress, tucking my quilt
close about me. The morning was still, warm and cloudy, not a ray of
sunshine visible, even for a moment, since sunset the night before.
"Time to dress your wounds!" said Agathemer.
He brought from the brook a cupful of water, and, with the smallest of the
rags, solicitously bathed the gouge on my hip. He pronounced it healing
healthily. He then anointed it with olive oil. The bathing and anointing
comforted me greatly. Then, he similarly treated my shoulder and foot.
When I was composed and covered he said:
"Now for the scissors!" and he sharpened them on his whetstone until he
felt satisfied that he could get them no sharper, then he clipped my hair
and beard, as closely as those scissors could. Then I sat up and clipped
him, awkwardly and unevenly, but effectively.
Hardly were we shorn when drops of rain began to patter on the leaves
above us. Agathemer wrapped his bread in the rags, put it between the two
hats and tucked it under the leaves in one inner corner of the little
grotto; bestowed the other things on it, or by it or in the other corner;
and then lay down by me and pulled his quilt over him, then managing to
cover both of us with leaves so that no trace of our presence would be
visible to any passer-by, yet we could breathe comfortably behind or under
our screen of leaves.
It rained all day, a sluggish drizzle, soaking the earth, but not
accumulating enough water on it to produce visible trickles flowing on the
surface. The air was perfectly windless, so that no rain blew in on us as
we lay; we were damp, but not wet.
Before dusk the rain ceased and a brisk, warm wind shook the drops from
the trees. We ate and Agathemer declared his intention of going on another
raid about an hour after dark.
"What are you after this time?" I queried.
"More food," he said, "all I dare steal. I must not steal too much from
any one place. I'll wager my pilferings of last night will pass, not
merely unheeded, but entirely unnoticed. Ofatulena herself is so scatter-
brained that she will never be sure that two loaves vanished from her
oven; I doubt if she will so much as suspect any loss. But I cannot repeat
that depletion of her baking tonight; she might talk. She is not quick-
witted enough to conjecture the truth, if she did her utter loyalty would
keep her mute; she'd impute the theft to some slave and likely as not have
an investigation and advertise her loss. If there happened to be a crafty
inspector with the Praetorians and if they have lingered, they might
suspect the truth, beat the woods for us and capture us. So I must take a
little here and a little there.
"Then I want another quilt for myself, and shoes for both of us. Is there
anything else you can think of?"
"Manifestly!" I said, "we need a slave-scourge, a branding-iron with the
long F for 'runaway', [Footnote: _Fugitivus_. The short F stood for _fur_,
"thief."] a brazier big enough to heat the branding iron and enough
charcoal to fire it once."
"What, in the name of Mercury," he whispered amazedly, "do you want of a
branding-iron and a scourge?"
"We are to pass as runaway slaves, if caught, according to your outline of
a plan," I said, "we had best do all we can to be sure of being thought
ordinary runaway slaves. Few slaves travel far from their owners' land
when they first venture to run away. We should be branded, to seem old
offenders.
"As for you, thanks to Nemestronia, your back is all it should be to help
play the part we intend. My back has no scars. You must scourge me till I
have as many as you."
In the late dusk, inside that grotto, under the dead leaves, I could see
the horror on his face.
"I scourge you!" he cried aloud.
"Hush!" I admonished him. "Scourged I must be, if I am to hope to escape
Caesar's agents as you have cleverly conceived that I might. Steal a
scourge and a branding-iron tonight, and let us be ready for the road as
soon as may be; we cannot set out northwards till my back is healed and
the brands on both of us, too."
We wrangled and argued till it was past time for him to start on his
expedition. I finally declared that, unless he fetched a scourge and a
branding-iron, I would, at daybreak, walk back to my villa and give myself
up to the authorities. At that he consented.
I went to sleep soon after he was gone and never woke till daylight.
I woke from a troubled sleep, haunted by nightmare dreams, woke aware of a
general discomfort, misery and horror, and of acute pain in my wounds. I
seemed to have a good appetite and ate with relish; but, hardly had I
ceased eating, when I appeared definitely feverish and the pain in my foot
became unbearable.
I told Agathemer how I felt and he examined my wounds. All three were
puffy, red, even purplish, and with pus at the edges. It was then and has
always been since a puzzle to both of us why wounds, seemingly healing
naturally when unwashed and undressed, should inflame and fester after
careful washing and dressing.
My fever was not high, but enough to make me fretful and irritable. The
day was very hot and still. I made Agathemer show me what spoil he had
brought and at once ordered him to light the charcoal brazier, heat the
iron and brand me. He demurred.
"If you feel feverish," he said, "the pain of the branding will double
your fever and, if you have three inflamed wounds, the brand will fester
to a certainty. You'll probably die of it, if I brand you."
"As well die one way as another," I said. "If we stay here we are certain
to be discovered sooner or later. Our only hope is to get away as soon as
may be. That cannot be until my back and both brands heal enough for us to
tramp northward. Your back is healed, so your brand will heal promptly. I
have to get over these wounds and the branding and scourging too. We must
be quick."
He argued, but I was half delirious and wholly unreasonable. I again
threatened to go straight to the villa and give myself up unless I had my
way.
Agathemer, distraught and aghast, yielded. I argued that in the early
haze, the little trifle of smoke from the charcoal could not attract
notice. He complied. He had trouble getting a light from his flint and
steel, but he succeeded, and, when the charcoal caught, set the little
brazier close to our nook and fanned it with a leafy bough to disperse the
smoke. When no further trace of smoke appeared and the charcoal glowed
evenly, he put the iron to heat.
When it was hot enough he suggested, again, that we put off branding me
till next day, and that he brand only himself. I insisted on his branding
me and branding me first.
To my amazement, when he had bared my shoulder, set me in position, and
snatched the iron from the brazier, I shrank back with a sort of weak
scream.
Agathemer instantly replaced the iron in the brazier and turned, staring
at me in silence.
Instantly I had a revulsion of resolution, of obstinacy, of delirious
rage. I reviled him. I commanded, I threatened.
Coolly he bared his left shoulder, knelt by the brazier and made as if to
brand himself.
"You can't do it," I protested, "you'll scar yourself to no purpose and
anyone will know the mark is not a brand. Fetch the iron here and hand it
to me."
He did, deftly. Without a wince or squeak he, kneeling and leaning, held
his shoulder to the white-hot iron. I could not have done better if I had
been well and standing, instead of delirious and sitting, wrapped in a
quilt, in a bed of dried leaves. I set the iron fair on the muscle of his
shoulder, held it there just the brief instant required for branding
without injury and snatched it away without any drag sideways.
After witnessing the stoical heroism of my slave I could not but insist on
his branding me and was exalted to the point of nerve-tension at which I
bit in my half-uttered scream as the heat seared my flesh. Agathemer
dressed each brand with an oil-soaked rag and we composed ourselves to
hide until dark.