"I have told you over and over," I retorted impatiently, "that my uncle's will enjoined me not to free Agathemer within five years, though he also enjoined that I was to make a new will at once so as to leave Agathemer free and recompensed if I died before the five years elapsed." "But the injunction was not binding," Tanno persisted, "either in law or by religious custom. No dead man can prevent his heirs freeing slaves he leaves them. Why heed the injunction?" "I could not contravene so explicit a behest of the dead," I demurred, "especially of a man I loved and revered. And you must recall my uncle's queer habit of acting on intuitions and the way he expressed them, always saying: "'It has been revealed to me that....' And his intuitions always seemed to amount to prevision, he never seemed to have acted amiss, however eccentric his act, however baseless his premonition. I have a feeling that in Agathemer's case he acted on some such presentiment." Tanno turned to Agathemer. "Do you feel that way too?" he demanded. "I most certainly do," said Agathemer, "I have a feeling that my remaining a slave is going to be of vital service to Hedulio, somehow, sometime." "Then you are content to remain a slave?" Tanno queried. "No one wants to remain a slave," Agathemer confessed, "and every slave longs to be a free man and is impatient to be free at once. But I try to be resigned, of course, and, except that I cannot rejoice in not being free, I am as well fed, clothed and housed as I should be as a free man and have as much leisure." Tanno glowered at both of us. I cut in: "You must remember that Agathemer was raised almost as a free man and almost as my brother. We slept and played together from the time we could walk. We had the same tutors, always, when in the country, both in Bruttium and in Sabinum. In Rome, while I was at school, Agathemer was taught the same subjects at home. We love each other almost as brothers. Both of us were amazed when grandfather left Agathemer to my Uncle instead of to my father or to me. We were more amazed at Uncle's will. But as things are between us, Agathemer not only looks forward to freedom and an estate within five years, but knows that his interval of waiting will be pleasant, as pleasant as I can make it." "But," Tanno objected, "think of the danger he is in while a slave. For instance, just suppose--(may the gods avert the omen)--that you were murdered in your bed this very night and no clue to the murderer found. Nothing could save Agathemer from being tortured along with all your other slaves." "Pooh!" I cried. "You are behind the times! You may be an unsurpassable expert on dress and manners, on perfumery and jewels, but you could know more law. All those ferocious old statutes have been abolished by the enactments of Antoninus and Aurelius. A slave, during good behavior, is almost as safe as a freedman."