‘You are quite right, Afer; Sabinus has about reached the end of his tether: he must be looked after,’ said Sejanus, taking out his tablets and making a memorandum. ‘I am right glad he has, at last, given vent to his ideas, so plainly in the presence of such an one as yourself, my friend. So you stayed your journey to tell me this?—it was kind.’ ‘Also to learn whether I can congratulate you on favourable news from Capreae.’ ‘Hush! not so loud, Afer!’ replied the Prefect, raising his finger warningly; ‘it will be time enough to speak freely of a matter when success is assured; then there is the better chance of possible failure being buried in silence. I expect a courier any moment.’ ‘Indeed!’ ‘I have waited within doors until now for his arrival—what he will bring I cannot tell.’ ‘I could guess,’ remarked Afer, with a courtly smile. ‘Humph!’ quoth the Prefect, shrugging his shoulders and smiling also. At the same moment the sound of voices caught his ears, and he stepped to the curtain and looked into the ante‐chamber. The courier he was so anxiously awaiting had just arrived, and the sentinel was advancing to announce the same. ‘Ha!’ exclaimed the Prefect, stepping into the ante‐chamber, ‘I expected you before this—your despatches!’ The courier unbuckled a stout leathern girdle which he wore underneath his tunic, and took out of a pouch, attached thereto, a packet, which he delivered into the eager hand of Sejanus. ‘Wait!’ said the latter briefly; and without returning to his chamber, he turned aside and broke the seals of the packet. With fingers trembling, and a heart eaten with excitement, he ran his eyes over the imperial missive. The next second his eyes flashed. With exultation written on every line of his handsome face he went back into the presence of Afer. ‘Ah,—I knew it,—I was right!’ remarked the latter, at the first glimpse of the Prefect’s glowing visage. ‘I give thee joy of thy noble Livia; and I congratulate myself that I am the first to do so.’ Sejanus grasped his client’s hand, and fairly laughed out in the exuberance of his feelings. ‘Enough, my Titus! This letter hath proved thee a good prophet. The daughter of Caesar is mine indeed, for Caesar himself declares it. Nay, more—I go to Capreae in a few days to claim her. So prepare, my friend, for thou must go along with me thither.’ ‘Willingly, and gladly, if you will tell me when.’ ‘Return within the week,’ said the Prefect. He clapped his hands loudly, and a slave appeared. ‘Bid the courier be ready to return to‐morrow! Give him wine—and this!’ he said, taking a small purse of money from the table and throwing it at the domestic’s feet. The slave picked it up, and said, ‘There is a man without demands to see you, Prefect—a workman, by appearance.’ ‘What is his business?’ ‘He will not say—only that he has come from Surrentum to see you.’ ‘Admit him then, and the sentinel as well.’