“I suffer more by your silence than were I to be told the truth, be the truth never so painful.” “Have I not said it? The Lady Quincta is in prison.” “Is that all?” Again he maintained an embarrassed silence. “It matters not,” said Perpetua firmly. “I will my own self find out what has taken place. I shall return to Nemausus on foot, and immediately. I will deliver myself up to the magistrate and demand my mother’s release.” “You must not go—the weather is terrible.” “I shall—nothing can stay me. I shall go, and go alone, and go at once.” “There is no need for such haste. It is not till to‐morrow that Quincta will be put on the rack.” “On the rack!” “Fool that I am! I have uttered what I should have kept secret.” “It is said. My resolve is formed. I return to Nemausus.” “Then,” said the deacon, “I will go with thee.” “There is no need. I will take Blanda.” “I will go. A girl, a young girl shames me. I run away from death, and she offers herself to the sword. Marcianus said I was a renegade. I will not be thought to have denied my Master—to have fled from martyrdom.” “Then,” said Perpetua, “I pray thee this—first give freedom unto Pedo.” Baudillas administered a slight stroke on the cheek to his slave, and said: “Go; thou art discharged from bondage.” CHAPTER XXII THE ARENA The games that were to be given in the amphitheater of Nemausus on the nones of March were due to a bequest of Domitius Afer, the celebrated, or rather infamous, informer and rhetorician, who had brought so many citizens of Rome to death during the principate of Tiberius. He had run great risk himself under Caligula, but had escaped by a piece of adroit flattery. In dying he bequeathed a large sum out of his ill‐gotten gains—the plunder of those whom he had destroyed, and whose families he had ruined—to be expended in games in the amphitheater on the nones of March, for the delectation of the citizens, and to keep his memory green in his native city. The games were to last two days. On the first there would be contests with beasts, and on the second a water combat, when the arena would be flooded and converted into a lake. Great anxiety was entertained relative to the weather. Unless the mistral ceased and the rain passed away, it would be impossible for the sports to be held. It was true that the entire oval could be covered in by curtains and mats, stretched between poles, but this contrivance was intended as shelter against sun and not rain. Moreover, the violence of the wind had rendered it quite impossible to extend the curtains. The town was in the liveliest excitement. The man guilty of having mutilated the statue had been sentenced to be cast to the beasts, and this man was no vulgar criminal out of the slums, but belonged to one of the superior “orders.”