Quintus gazed vaguely up at the driving clouds, that scudded wildly along like a host of uneasy spirits. They packed and tumbled together, hiding the few stars which had peeped forth in the dark sky. “I cannot help it,” thought Quintus, tightening his lips. “I have no choice in the matter. If the whole world round me crumbles into eternal night--I cannot help it!” The wounded man, exhausted by his too eager talk with Thrax, lay meanwhile silent and motionless on his couch. Even when Quintus slipped the straps on to his own shoulders he seemed indifferent to the fact; only a faint cry of surprise betrayed, that he had not swooned or fallen asleep. They had gained the Via Labicana at last, and were toiling up the slippery way. Blepyrus was just going to take his master’s share of the burden again, when he suddenly became aware of a shade at a few paces distance, which at first stole stooping down close to the hedge, and then suddenly made for the open country, bounding across the road with long steps. “What was that?” asked Quintus, who had also observed the noise and running figure. “Some wild creature perhaps,” said Euterpe. “It was a man,” said Eurymachus. Quintus stopped and gazed out into the darkness; then, turning to Eurymachus, he asked with evident anxiety: “When did you first see him?” “This minute, as we came upon the road.” “I saw him before,” said Blepyrus in a whisper, as though a similar shade might at any moment start forth in the gloom. “Out there, by that bush in the middle of the field something moved and scudded past. I thought it was some night-bird.” “They are sitting snugly in their nests,” said Diphilus. Blepyrus did not answer; he was considering. “It seems to me,” he said at length, “that I have seen that peculiar skulking walk and sudden disappearance before. He vanished like lightning.” “And he meant no good,” added the flute-player. “In short, it was a spy sent out by the slave-catchers, and before we can reach the gate the town-watch will be upon us.” “Then we must be doubly careful,” said Quintus, forcing his pulses to beat more calmly. “We must toil across country again as far as the Via Praenestina.[356] It will be heavy walking, almost up to our knees in the soil.--But listen! is not that the tramp of horses? Coming from the city--not a thousand paces away.” “Lord and Saviour!” groaned Euterpe. “The man must have flown like the wind.” “He must indeed, if these horsemen have come at his call. No, the swiftest cannot be so swift as that. It is all the same; forewarned is forearmed. What is that to the right of the road?” “A fountain, or something of the kind,” replied Blepyrus. “We will hide behind the wall, till the horsemen have passed.”