THE FALL OF ROME
1. EDDORE
Like two high executives of a Tellurian corporation discussing business
affairs during a chance meeting at one of their clubs, Eddore's All
Highest and Gharlane, his second in command, were having the Eddorian
equivalent of an after-business-hours chat.
"You did a nice job on Tellus," the All-Highest commended. "On the other
three, too, of course, but Tellus was so far and away the worst of the
lot that the excellence of the work stands out. When the Atlantean
nations destroyed each other so thoroughly I thought that this thing
called 'democracy' was done away with forever, but it seems to be mighty
hard to kill. However, I take it that you have this Rome situation
entirely under control?"
"Definitely. Mithradates of Pontus was mine. So were both Sulla and
Marius. Through them and others I killed practically all of the brains
and ability of Rome, and reduced that so-called 'democracy' to a
howling, aimless mob. My Nero will end it. Rome will go on by
momentum--outwardly, will even appear to grow--for a few generations,
but what Nero will do can never be undone."
"Good. A difficult task, truly."
"Not difficult, exactly ... but it's so damned _steady_." Gharlane's
thought was bitter. "But that's the hell of working with such
short-lived races. Since each creature lives only a minute or so, they
change so fast that a man can't take his mind off of them for a second.
I've been wanting to take a little vacation trip back to our old
time-space, but it doesn't look as though I'll be able to do it until
after they get some age and settle down."
"That won't be too long. Life-spans lengthen, you know, as races
approach their norms."
"Yes. But none of the others is having half the trouble that I am. Most
of them, in fact, have things coming along just about the way they want
them. My four planets are raising more hell than all the rest of both
galaxies put together, and I know that it isn't me--next to you, I'm the
most efficient operator we've got. What I'm wondering about is why I
happen to be the goat."
"Precisely because you _are_ our most efficient operator." If an
Eddorian can be said to smile, the All-Highest smiled. "You know, as
well as I do, the findings of the Integrator."
"Yes, but I am wondering more and more as to whether to believe them
unreservedly or not. Spores from an extinct life-form--suitable
environments--operation of the laws of chance--Tommyrot! I am beginning
to suspect that chance is being strained beyond its elastic limit, for
my particular benefit, and as soon as I can find out who is doing that
straining there will be one empty place in the Innermost Circle."
"Have a care, Gharlane!" All levity, all casualness disappeared. "Whom
do you suspect? Whom do you accuse?"
"Nobody, as yet. The true angle never occurred to me until just now,
while I have been discussing the thing with you. Nor shall I either
suspect or accuse, ever. I shall determine, then I shall act."
"In defiance of _me_? Of _my_ orders?" the All-Highest demanded, his
short temper flaring.
"Say, rather, in support," the lieutenant shot back, unabashed. "If some
one is working on me through my job, what position are you probably
already in, without knowing it? Assume that I am right, that these four
planets of mine got the way they are because of monkey business inside
the Circle. Who would be next? And how sure are you that there isn't
something similar, but not so far advanced, already aimed at you? It
seems to me that serious thought is in order."
"Perhaps so.... You may be right.... There have been a few
nonconformable items. Taken separately, they did not seem to be of any
importance; but together, and considered in this new light...."
Thus was borne out the conclusion of the Arisian Elders that the
Eddorians would not at that time deduce Arisia; and thus Eddore lost its
chance to begin in time the forging of a weapon with which to oppose
effectively Arisia's--Civilization's--Galactic Patrol, so soon to come
into being.
If either of the two had been less suspicious, less jealous, less
arrogant and domineering--in other words, had not been Eddorians--this
History of Civilization might never have been written; or written very
differently and by another hand.
Both were, however, Eddorians.
2. ARISIA
In the brief interval between the fall of Atlantis and the rise of Rome
to the summit of her power, Eukonidor of Arisia had aged scarcely at
all. He was still a youth. He was, and would be for many centuries to
come, a Watchman. Although his mind was powerful enough to understand
the Elders' visualization of the course of Civilization--in fact, he had
already made significant progress in his own visualization of the Cosmic
All--he was not sufficiently mature to contemplate unmoved the events
which, according to all Arisian visualizations, were bound to occur.
"Your feeling is but natural, Eukonidor." Drounli, the Moulder
principally concerned with the planet Tellus, meshed his mind smoothly
with that of the young Watchman. "We do not enjoy it ourselves, as you
know. It is, however, _necessary_. In no other way can the ultimate
triumph of Civilization be assured."
"But can nothing be done to alleviate...?" Eukonidor paused.
Drounli waited. "Have you any suggestions to offer?"
"None," the younger Arisian confessed. "But I thought ... you, or the
Elders, so much older and stronger ... could...."
"We can not. Rome will fall. It must be allowed to fall."
"It will be Nero, then? And we can do nothing?"
"Nero. We can do little enough. Our forms of flesh--Petronius, Acte, and
the others--will do whatever they can; but their powers will be exactly
the same as those of other human beings of their time. They must be and
will be constrained, since any show of unusual powers, either mental or
physical, would be detected instantly and would be far too revealing. On
the other hand, Nero--that is, Gharlane of Eddore--will be operating
much more freely."
"Very much so. Practically unhampered, except in purely physical
matters. But, if nothing can be done to stop it.... If Nero must be
allowed to sow his seeds of ruin...."
And upon that cheerless note the conference ended.
3. ROME
"But what have you, Livius, or any of us, for that matter, got to live
for?" demanded Patroclus the gladiator of his cell-mate. "We are well
fed, well kept, well exercised; like horses. But, like horses, we are
lower than slaves. Slaves have some freedom of action; most of us have
none. We fight--fight whoever or whatever our cursed owners send us
against. Those of us who live fight again; but the end is certain and
comes soon. I had a wife and children once. So did you. Is there any
chance, however slight, that either of us will ever know them again; or
learn even whether they live or die? None. At this price, is your life
worth living? Mine is not."
Livius the Bithynian, who had been staring out past the bars of the
cubicle and over the smooth sand of the arena toward Nero's garlanded
and purple-bannered throne, turned and studied his fellow gladiator from
toe to crown. The heavily-muscled legs, the narrow waist, the
sharply-tapering torso, the enormous shoulders. The leonine head,
surmounted by an unkempt shock of red-bronze-auburn hair. And, lastly,
the eyes--gold-flecked, tawny eyes--hard and cold now with a ferocity
and a purpose not to be concealed.
"I have been more or less expecting something of this sort," Livius said
then, quietly. "Nothing overt--you have builded well, Patroclus--but to
one who knows gladiators as I know them there has been something in the
wind for weeks past. I take it that someone swore his life for me and
that I should not ask who that friend might be."
"One did. You should not."
"So be it. To my unknown sponsor, then, and to the gods, I give thanks,
for I am wholly with you. Not that I have any hope. Although your tribe
breeds men--from your build and hair and eyes you descend from
Spartacus himself--you know that even he did not succeed. Things now are
worse, infinitely worse, than they were in his day. No one who has ever
plotted against Nero has had any measure of success; not even his
scheming slut of a mother. All have died, in what fashions you know.
Nero is vile, the basest of the base. Nevertheless, his spies are the
most efficient that the world has ever known. In spite of that, I feel
as you do. If I can take with me two or three of the Praetorians, I die
content. But by your look, your plan is not what I thought, to storm
vainly Nero's podium yonder. Have you, by any chance, some trace of hope
of success?"
"More than a trace; much more." The Thracian's teeth bared in a wolfish
grin. "His spies are, as you say, very good. But, this time, so are we.
Just as hard and just as ruthless. Many of his spies among us have died;
most, if not all, of the rest are known. They, too, shall die. Glatius,
for instance. Once in a while, by the luck of the gods, a man kills a
better man than he is; but Glatius has done it six times in a row,
without getting a scratch. But the next time he fights, in spite of
Nero's protection, Glatius dies. Word has gone out, and there are
gladiators' tricks that Nero never heard of."
"Quite true. One question, and I too may begin to hope. This is not the
first time that gladiators have plotted against Ahenobarbus. Before the
plotters could accomplish anything, however, they found themselves
matched against each other and the signal was always for death, never
for mercy. Has this...?" Livius paused.
"It has not. It is that which gives me the hope I have. Nor are we
gladiators alone in this. We have powerful friends at court; one of whom
has for days been carrying a knife sharpened especially to slip between
Nero's ribs. That he still carries that knife and that we still live are
proofs enough for me that Ahenobarbus, the matricide and incendiary, has
no suspicion whatever of what is going on."
(At this point Nero on his throne burst into a roar of laughter, his
gross body shaking with a merriment which Petronius and Tigellinus
ascribed to the death-throes of a Christian woman in the arena.)
"Is there any small thing which I should be told in order to be of
greatest use?" Livius asked.
"Several. The prisons and the pits are so crowded with Christians that
they die and stink, and a pestilence threatens. To mend matters, some
scores of hundreds of them are to be crucified here tomorrow."
"Why not? Everyone knows that they are poisoners of wells and murderers
of children, and practitioners of magic. Wizards and witches."
"True enough." Patroclus shrugged his massive shoulders. "But to get on,
tomorrow night, at full dark, the remaining hundreds who have not been
crucified are to be--have you ever seen sarmentitii and semaxii?"
"Once only. A gorgeous spectacle, truly, almost as thrilling as to feel
a man die on your sword. Men and women, wrapped in oil-soaked garments
smeared with pitch and chained to posts, make splendid torches indeed.
You mean, then, that...?"
"Aye. In Caesar's own garden. When the light is brightest Nero will ride
in parade. When his chariot passes the tenth torch our ally swings his
knife. The Praetorians will rush around, but there will be a few moments
of confusion during which we will go into action and the guards will
die. At the same time others of our party will take the palace and kill
every man, woman, and child adherent to Nero."
"Very nice--in theory." The Bithynian was frankly skeptical. "But just
how are we going to get there? A few gladiators--such champions as
Patroclus of Thrace--are at times allowed to do pretty much as they
please in their free time, and hence could possibly be on hand to take
part in such a brawl, but most of us will be under lock and guard."
"That too, has been arranged. Our allies near the throne and certain
other nobles and citizens of Rome, who have been winning large sums by
our victories, have prevailed upon our masters to give a grand banquet
to _all_ gladiators tomorrow night, immediately following the mass
crucifixion. It is going to be held in the Claudian Grove, just across
from Caesar's Gardens."
"Ah!" Livius breathed deep; his eyes flashed. "By Baal and Bacchus! By
the round, high breasts of Isis! For the first time in years I begin to
live! Our masters die first, then and there ... but hold--weapons?"
"Will be provided. Bystanders will have them, and armor and shields,
under their cloaks. Our owners first, yes; and then the Praetorians. But
note, Livius, that Tigellinus, the Commander of the Guard, is mine--mine
alone. I, personally, am going to cut his heart out."
"Granted. I heard that he had your wife for a time. But you seem quite
confident that you will still be alive tomorrow night. By Baal and
Ishtar, I wish I could feel so! With something to live for at last, I
can feel my guts turning to water--I can hear Charon's oars. Like as
not, now, some toe-dancing stripling of a retiarius will entangle me in
his net this very afternoon, and no mercy signal has been or will be
given this day. Such is the crowd's temper, from Caesar down, that even
you will get 'Pollice verso' if you fall."
"True enough. But you had better get over that feeling, if you want to
live. As for me, I'm safe enough. I have made a vow to Jupiter, and he
who has protected me so long will not desert me now. Any man or any
thing who faces me during these games, dies."
"I hope so, sin ... but listen! The horns ... and someone is coming!"
The door behind them swung open. A lanista, or master of gladiators,
laden with arms and armor, entered. The door swung to and was locked
from the outside. The visitor was obviously excited, but stared
wordlessly at Patroclus for seconds.
"Well, Iron-heart," he burst out finally, "aren't you even curious about
what you have got to do today?"
"Not particularly," Patroclus replied, indifferently. "Except to dress
to fit. Why? Something special?"
"_Extra_ special. The sensation of the year. Fermius himself. Unlimited.
Free choice of weapons and armor."
"Fermius!" Livius exclaimed. "Fermius the Gaul? May Athene cover you
with her shield!"
"You can say that for me, too," the lanista agreed, callously. "Before I
knew who was entered, like a fool, I bet a hundred sesterces on
Patroclus here, at odds of only one to two, against the field. But
listen, Bronze-head. If you get the best of Fermius, I'll give you a
full third of my winnings."
"Thanks. You'll collect. A good man, Fermius, and smart. I've heard a
lot about him, but never saw him work. He has seen me, which isn't so
good. Both heavy and fast--somewhat lighter than I am, and a bit faster.
He knows that I always fight Thracian, and that I'd be a fool to try
anything else against him. He fights either Thracian or Samnite
depending upon the opposition. Against me his best bet would be to go
Samnite. Do you know?"
"No. They didn't say. He may not decide until the last moment."
"Unlimited, against me, he'll go Samnite. He'll have to. These
unlimiteds are tough, but it gives me a chance to use a new trick I've
been working on. I'll take that sword there--no scabbard--and two
daggers, besides my gladius. Get me a mace; the lightest real mace
they've got in their armory."
"A _mace_! Fighting _Thracian_, against a _Samnite_?"
"Exactly. A mace. Am I going to fight Fermius, or do you want to do it
yourself?"
The mace was brought and Patroclus banged it, with a two-handed
roundhouse swing, against a stone of the wall. The head remained solid
upon the shaft. Good. They waited.
Trumpets blared; the roar of the vast assemblage subsided almost to
silence.
"Grand Champion Fermius versus Grand Champion Patroclus," came the
raucous announcement. "Single combat. Any weapons that either chooses to
use, used in any way possible. No rest, no intermission. Enter!"
Two armored figures strode toward the center of the arena. Patroclus'
armor, from towering helmet down, and including the shield, was of
dully-gleaming steel, completely bare of ornament. Each piece was marred
and scarred; very plainly that armor was for use and had been used. On
the other hand, the Samnite half-armor of the Gaul was resplendent with
the decorations affected by his race. Fermius' helmet sported three
brilliantly-colored plumes, his shield and cuirass, enameled in half the
colors of the spectrum, looked as though they were being worn for the
first time.
Five yards apart, the gladiators stopped and wheeled to face the podium
upon which Nero lolled. The buzz of conversation--the mace had excited
no little comment and speculation--ceased. Patroclus heaved his
ponderous weapon into the air; the Gaul whirled up his long, sharp
sword. They chanted in unison:
"Ave, Caesar Imperator!
Morituri te salutant!"
The starting-flag flashed downward; and at its first sight, long before
it struck the ground, both men moved. Fermius whirled and leaped; but,
fast as he was, he was not quite fast enough. That mace, which had
seemed so heavy in the Thracian's hands a moment before, had become
miraculously maneuverable--it was hurtling through the air directly
toward the middle of his body! It did not strike its goal--Patroclus
hoped that he was the only one there who suspected that he had not
expected it to touch his opponent--but in order to dodge the missile
Fermius had to break his stride; lost momentarily the fine co-ordination
of his attack. And in that moment Patroclus struck. Struck, and struck
again.
But, as has been said, Fermius was both strong and fast. The first
blow, aimed backhand at his bare right leg, struck his shield instead.
The left-handed stab, shield-encumbered as the left arm was, ditto. So
did the next trial, a vicious forehand cut. The third of the mad flurry
of swordcuts, only partially deflected by the sword which Fermius could
only then get into play, sheared down and a red, a green, and a white
plume floated toward the ground. The two fighters sprang apart and
studied each other briefly.
From the gladiators' standpoint, this had been the veriest preliminary
skirmishing. That the Gaul had lost his plumes and that his armor showed
great streaks of missing enamel meant no more to either than that the
Thracian's supposedly surprise attack had failed. Each knew that he
faced the deadliest fighter of his world; but if that knowledge affected
either man, the other could not perceive it.
But the crowd went wild. Nothing like that first terrific
passage-at-arms had ever before been seen. Death, sudden and violent,
had been in the air. The arena was saturated with it. Hearts had been
ecstatically in throats. Each person there, man or woman, had felt the
indescribable thrill of death--vicariously, safely--and every fiber of
their lusts demanded more. More! Each spectator knew that one of those
men would die that afternoon. None wanted, or would permit them both to
live. This was to the death, and death there would be.
Women, their faces blotched and purple with emotion, shrieked and
screamed. Men, stamping their feet and waving their arms, yelled and
swore. And many, men and women alike, laid wagers.
"Five hundred sesterces on Fermius!" one shouted, tablet and stylus in
air.
"Taken!" came an answering yell. "The Gaul is done--Patroclus all but
had him there!"
"One thousand, you!" came another challenge. "Patroclus missed his
chance and will never get another--a thousand on Fermius!"
"Two thousand!"
"Five thousand!"
"Ten!"
The fighters closed--swung--stabbed. Shields clanged vibrantly under the
impact of fended strokes, swords whined and snarled. Back and
forth--circling--giving and taking ground--for minute after endless
minute that desperately furious exhibition of skill, of speed and of
power and of endurance went on. And as it went on, longer and longer
past the time expected by even the most optimistic, tension mounted
higher and higher.
Blood flowed crimson down the Gaul's bare leg and the crowd screamed its
approval. Blood trickled out of the joints of the Thracian's armor and
it became a frenzied mob.
No human body could stand that pace for long. Both men were tiring fast,
and slowing. With the drive of his weight and armor, Patroclus forced
the Gaul to go where he wanted him to go. Then, apparently gathering his
every resource for a final effort, the Thracian took one short, choppy
step forward and swung straight down, with all his strength.
The blood-smeared hilt turned in his hands; the blade struck flat and
broke, its length whining viciously away. Fermius, although staggered by
the sheer brute force of the abortive stroke, recovered almost
instantly; dropping his sword and snatching at his gladius to take
advantage of the wonderful opportunity thus given him.
But that breaking had not been accidental; Patroclus made no attempt to
recover his balance. Instead, he ducked past the surprised and shaken
Gaul. Still stooping, he seized the mace, which everyone except he had
forgotten, and swung; swung with all the totalized and synchronized
power of hands, wrists, arms, shoulders, and magnificent body.
The iron head of the ponderous weapon struck the center of the Gaul's
cuirass, which crunched inward like so much cardboard. Fermius seemed to
leave the ground and, folded around the mace, to fly briefly through the
air. As he struck the ground, Patroclus was upon him. The Gaul was
probably already dead--that blow would have killed an elephant--but that
made no difference. If that mob knew that Fermius was dead, they might
start yelling for his life, too. Hence, by lifting his head and poising
his dirk high in air, he asked of Caesar his Imperial will.
The crowd, already frantic, had gone stark mad at the blow. No thought
of mercy could or did exist in that insanely bloodthirsty throng; no
thought of clemency for the man who had fought such a magnificent fight.
In cooler moments they would have wanted him to live, to thrill them
again and yet again; but now, for almost half an hour, they had been
loving the hot, the suffocating thrill of death in their throats. Now
they wanted, and would have, the ultimate thrill.
"Death!" The solid structure rocked to the crescendo roar of the demand.
"_Death_! DEATH!"
Nero's right thumb pressed horizontally against his chest. Every vestal
was making the same sign. Pollice verso. Death. The strained and
strident yelling of the mob grew even louder.
Patroclus lowered his dagger and delivered the unnecessary and unfelt
thrust; and--
"Peractum est!" arose one deafening yell.
* * * * *
Thus the red-haired Thracian lived; and also, somewhat to his own
surprise, did Livius.
"I'm glad to see you, Bronze-heart, by the white thighs of Ceres, I am!"
that worthy exclaimed, when the two met, the following day. Patroclus
had never seen the Bithynian so buoyant. "Pallas Athene covered you,
like I asked her to. But by the red beak of Thoth and the sacred Zaimph
of Tanit, it gave me the horrors when you made that throw so quick and
missed it, and I went as crazy as the rest of them when you pulled the
real coup. But now, curse it, I suppose that we'll all have to be on the
lookout for it--or no, unlimiteds aren't common, thank Ninib the Smiter
and his scarlet spears!"
"I hear you didn't do so badly, yourself," Patroclus interrupted his
friend's loquacity. "I missed your first two, but I saw you take
Kalendios. He's a high-rater--one of the best of the locals--and I was
afraid he might snare you, but from the looks of you, you got only a
couple of stabs. Nice work."
"Prayer, my boy. Prayer is the stuff. I prayed to 'em in order, and hit
the jackpot with Shamash. My guts curled up again, like they belong, and
I knew that the portents were all in my favor. Besides, when you were
walking out to meet Fermius, did you notice that red-headed Greek
posturer making passes at you?"
"Huh? Don't be a fool. I had other things to think of."
"So I figured. So did she, probably, because after a while she came
around behind with a lanista and made eyes at me. I must have the next
best shape to you here, I guess. What a wench! Anyway, I felt better and
better, and before she left I knew that no damn retiarius that ever
waved a trident could put a net past my guard. And they couldn't either.
A couple more like that and I'll be a Grand Champion myself. But they're
digging holes for the crosses and there's the horn that the feast is
ready. This show is going to be really good."
They ate, hugely and with unmarred appetite, of the heaped food which
Nero had provided. They returned to their assigned places to see
crosses, standing as close together as they could be placed and each
bearing a suffering Christian, filling the whole vast expanse of the
arena.
And, if the truth must be told, those two men enjoyed thoroughly every
moment of that long and sickeningly horrible afternoon. They were the
hardest products of the hardest school the world has ever known: trained
rigorously to deal out death mercilessly at command; to accept death
unflinchingly at need. They should not and can not be judged by the
higher, finer standards of a softer, gentler day.
The afternoon passed; evening approached. All the gladiators then in
Rome assembled in the Claudian Grove, around tables creaking under their
loads of food and wine. Women, too, were there in profusion; women for
the taking and yearning to be taken; and the tide of revelry ran open,
wide, and high. Although all ate and apparently drank with abandon, most
of the wine was in fact wasted. And as the sky darkened, most of the
gladiators, one by one, began to get rid of their female companions upon
one pretext or another and to drift toward the road which separated the
festivities from the cloaked and curious throng of lookers-on.
At full dark, a red glare flared into the sky from Caesar's garden and
the gladiators, deployed now along the highway, dashed across it and
seemed to wrestle briefly with cloaked figures. Then armed,
more-or-less-armored men ran back to the scene of their reveling.
Swords, daggers, and gladii thrust, stabbed, and cut. Tables and benches
ran red; ground and grass grew slippery with blood.
The conspirators turned then and rushed toward the Emperor's brilliantly
torch-lit garden. Patroclus, however, was not in the van. He had had
trouble in finding a cuirass big enough for him to get into. He had been
delayed further by the fact that he had had to kill three strange
lanistae before he could get at his owner, the man he really wanted to
slay. He was therefore some little distance behind the other gladiators
when Petronius rushed up to him and seized him by the arm.
White and trembling, the noble was not now the exquisite Arbiter
Elegantiae; nor the imperturbable Augustian.
"Patroclus! In the name of Bacchus, Patroclus, why do the men go there
now? No signal was given--I could not get to Nero!"
"What?" the Thracian blazed. "Vulcan and his fiends! It _was_ given--I
heard it myself! What went wrong?"
"Everything." Petronius licked his lips. "I was standing right beside
him. No one else was near enough to interfere. It was--should have
been--easy. But after I got my knife out I couldn't move. It was his
_eyes_, Patroclus--I swear it, by the white breasts of Venus! He has the
evil eye--I couldn't move a muscle, I tell you! Then, although I didn't
want to, I turned and ran!"
"How did you find _me_ so quick?"
"I--I--I--don't know," the frantic Arbiter stuttered. "I ran and ran,
and there you were. But what are we--you--going to do?"
Patroclus' mind raced. He believed implicitly that Jupiter guarded him
personally. He believed in the other gods and goddesses of Rome. He more
than half believed in the multitudinous deities of Greece, of Egypt, and
even of Babylon. The other world was real and close; the evil eye only
one of the many inexplicable facts of every-day life. Nevertheless, in
spite of his credulity--or perhaps in part because of it--he also
believed firmly in himself; in his own powers. Wherefore he soon came to
a decision.
"Jupiter, ward from me Ahenobarbus' evil eye!" he called aloud, and
turned.
"Where are you going?" Petronius, still shaking, demanded.
"To do the job _you_ swore to do, of course--to kill that bloated toad.
And then to give Tigellinus what I have owed him so long."
At full run, he soon overtook his fellows, and waded resistlessly into
the fray. He was Grand Champion Patroclus, working at his trade; the
hard-learned trade which he knew so well. No Praetorian or ordinary
soldier could stand before him save momentarily. He did not have all of
his Thracian armor, but he had enough. Man after man faced him, and man
after man died.
And Nero, sitting at ease with a beautiful boy at his right and a
beautiful harlot at his left, gazed appreciatively through his emerald
lens at the flaming torches; the while, with a very small fraction of
his Eddorian mind, he mused upon the matter of Patroclus and Tigellinus.
Should he let the Thracian kill the Commander of his Guard? Or not? It
didn't really matter, one way or the other. In fact, nothing about this
whole foul planet--this ultra-microscopic, if offensive, speck of cosmic
dust in the Eddorian Scheme of Things--really mattered at all. It would
be mildly amusing to watch the gladiator consummate his vengeance by
carving the Roman to bits. But, on the other hand, there was such a
thing as pride of workmanship. Viewed in that light, the Thracian could
not kill Tigellinus, because that bit of corruption had a few more jobs
to do. He must descend lower and lower into unspeakable depravity,
finally to cut his own throat with a razor. Although Patroclus would not
know it--it was better technique not to let him know it--the Thracian's
proposed vengeance would have been futility itself compared with that
which the luckless Roman was to wreak on himself.
Wherefore a shrewdly-placed blow knocked the helmet from Patroclus' head
and a mace crashed down, spattering his brains abroad.
* * * * *
Thus ended the last significant attempt to save the civilization of
Rome; in a fiasco so complete that even such meticulous historians as
Tacitus and Suetonius mention it merely as a minor disturbance of Nero's
garden party.
* * * * *
_The planet Tellus circled its sun some twenty hundred times. Sixty-odd
generations of men were born and died, but that was not enough. The
Arisian program of genetics required more. Therefore the Elders, after
due deliberation, agreed that that Civilization, too, must be allowed to
fall. And Gharlane of Eddore, recalled to duty from the middle of a
much-too-short vacation, found things in very bad shape indeed and went
busily to work setting them to rights. He had slain one fellow-member of
the Innermost Circle, but there might very well have been more than one
Master involved._
BOOK TWO
THE WORLD WAR