“Eu!” he answered, “I shall not want for good friends, I see!  How glad I shall be to grasp your hands!  But is not this a very small boat?  I see men going on board the galleys by the shore.”

“You shall be satisfied in a moment, kyrios,” repeated Achillas, with suave assurance, “that the quicksands by the mole are very dangerous to large vessels.  Will you do us the honour to come aboard?”

Agias felt as though he must howl, scream, spring into the sea—­do anything to break the horrible suspense that oppressed him.

A woman was taking leave of Pompeius on the deck, a tall, stately, patrician lady, with a sweet, trouble-worn face; Agias knew that she was Cornelia Scipionis.  She was adjuring her husband not to go ashore, and he was replying that it was impossible to refuse; that if the Egyptians meant evil, they could easily master all the fugitives with their armament.  Several of the Magnus’s servants came down into the boat—­couple of trusted centurions, a valued freedman called Philip, a slave named Scythes.  Finally Pompeius tore himself from his wife’s arms.

“Do not grieve, all will be well!” were his words, while the boat’s crew put out their hands to receive him; and he added, “We must make the best choice of evils.  I am no longer my own master.  Remember Sophocles’s iambics,

  “He that once enters at a tyrant’s door
  Becomes a slave, though he were free before.’”

The general seated himself on the stern seat between the Egyptian officers.  Agias bent to his oar in sheer relief at finding some way in which to vent his feelings; and tugged at the heavy paddle until its tough blade bent almost to cracking.  The silence on the part of the officers was ominous.  Not a word, not a hint of recognition, came from Achillas or his Italian associates, from the instant that Pompeius set foot in the boat.  The stillness became awkward.  The Magnus, flushed and embarrassed, turned to Septimius.  “I was not mistaken in understanding that you were my fellow-soldier in years past?” His answer was a surly nod.  Pompeius, however, reined his rising feelings, and took up and began to re-read some tablets on which he had written an address in Greek, to be delivered before the king.  Agias rowed on with the energy of helpless desperation.  They were very close to the quay.  A company of the royal body-guard in gala armour stood as if awaiting the distinguished visitor.  For a moment the young Hellene believed that Achillas was sincere in his errand.

The boat drew up to the landing; one or two of the rowers sprang to the dock and made her fast.  Agias was unshipping his oar.  His thought was that he must now contrive the escape of Cornelia.  Pompeius half rose from his seat; the boat was pitching in the choppy harbour swell; the general steadied himself by grasping the hands of Philip the freedman.  Suddenly, like the swoop of a hawk on its prey, Agias saw the right hand of Septimius tear his short sword