"He was with Justin Classicus; I attended him. When Flora danced and chose her lover, and the two fled into the Temple of Rannu, the Alexandrian cried to my lord that there was another passage into the Temple, by which they could go in, or the Flora and her lover come out. And he proposed for a prank that he and the prince go thither and discover Flora and her lover. We were on the roof of a bath and could get down at once, so we ran through private passages, my lord and I, outstripping Classicus, whom the crowd swallowed. And when we got into this dark street, two fell upon us without warning and killed us both!" "But it was Agrippa who struck that blow," Marsyas declared. The man murmured again. "Some one struck me," he said finally; "mayhap the prince, not knowing friend from foe in the street." "Of a surety, this stiff old Roman took chances," Marsyas averred after thought, "with but one apparitor to aid him against Agrippa, palestrae-trained and this young charioteer! Art sure thou didst not play the craven, Eutychus?" he demanded. "Or should I be blamed," Eutychus groaned, "when it was three against me, with the prince striking at his single defender?" Marsyas fell silent. It was not like Agrippa to be confused under any circumstances. He pulled up beside Agrippa's vessel, roused the watchman and had the prince and Eutychus taken aboard; but Vasti and Lydia he left in the borrowed punt, out of sight of the crew that had returned. He followed the injured men on deck and hurriedly dressed Agrippa's wound, restored him to consciousness and left him in the charge of the captain of the vessel. He ordered one of the skilled seamen to attend Eutychus and hurried back to the women in the boat under the black shadow of the ship. He pulled straight for the sea, rounded Eunostos point and skirting the tiny archipelagoes in the broad light of the Pharos, brought up at a small indented coast between two sandy peninsulas. Here the residence portion of Alexandria came down to the ocean. The locality was dark and wrapped in sleep. As he lifted Lydia from the boat, Marsyas turned to Vasti. "Why didst thou not prevent her in this thing?" he asked in Hindu. "The white brother forgets that I am a handmaiden," she replied. "But what if I had not come?" he persisted, growing more troubled by his perplexities. "I had prepared a path for escape; I was armed, and watching!" "Did--did she expect me?" he asked after silence. "No." Then she had done this thing for him. Oh, for the safe refuge of the alabarch's musky halls that he might harken to the sweet distress in his soul and tell her of it! Without further event, they reached the alabarch's house and the bayadere, producing keys, let her charges into the servant's entry beneath the porch. Lydia instantly disappeared, but Vasti in obedience to a word from Marsyas conducted him through the well-beloved chambers to the corridor lined by the sleeping-rooms of the servants.