“This is not Rome,” said the governor, “as you would very soon discover if you occupied my office.  I sent a lictor and a dozen men to Norbanus’ house, but he is missing and has not been seen, although it is known, and you admit, that he dined with you last night at Daphne.  He has no property worth mentioning.  His house is under lien to money-lenders.  He is well known to have been Sextus’ friend, and the moment this order arrived proscribing Sextus I added to it the name of Norbanus in my own handwriting, on the principle that treason keeps bad company.

“My own well known allegiance to the emperor obliges me to tear out the very roots of treason at the first suggestion of its presence in our midst.  I have long suspected Sextus, who was a cross-grained, obstinate, quick-witted, proud young man—­a lot too critical.  I am convinced now that he and Norbanus were hatching some kind of plot between them—­possibly against the sacred person of our emperor—­a frightful sacrilege!—­the suggestion of it makes me shudder!  There is, of course, no doubt about Sextus; the emperor’s own proscription brands him as a miscreant unfit to live, and he was lucky to have died by accident instead of being torn apart by tongs.  It seems to me unquestionable that Norbanus shared his guilt and took care to escape before he could be seized and brought to justice.  What is in doubt, most noble Pertinax, is how you can excuse yourself to our sacred emperor for having let Sextus escape from your clutches, after you had seen that letter!  How can you excuse yourself for not pouncing the letter, to be used as evidence against rascally freedmen who forewarned the miscreant Sextus about the emperor’s intentions?—­and for not realizing that Norbanus was undoubtedly in league with him?  How can you explain your having let Norbanus get away is something I confess I am unable to imagine.”

“Conjure your imagination!” Pertinax retorted.  “I am to inquire into the suitability of Antioch or Daphne as the site of the Olympic games that the emperor proposed to preside over in person.  You can imagine, I suppose, how profitable that would be for Antioch—­and you.  Am I to tell the emperor that robbers in the mountains and the laxity of local government make the selection of Antioch unwise?”

They stared at each other silently across the table, Pertinax erect and definite, the governor of Antioch indefinite and stroking his chin with fat, white fingers.

“It would be simplest,” said the governor of Antioch at last, “to have Norbanus executed.”

“Some one should always be executed when the emperor signs proscription lists!” said Pertinax.  “Has it ever occurred to you to wonder how many soldiers in the legions in the distant provinces were certified as dead before they left Rome?”

The governor of Antioch smiled meanly.  He resented the suggestions that there might be tricks he did not understand.