“Right as usual, Pratinas!  By all the gods, but I believe you can save me!”

“Yes; as soon as Drusus is dead,” insinuated the Greek who was already computing his bill for brokerage in this little affair, “you can raise plenty of loans, on the strength of your coming marriage with Cornelia.”

“But how will you manage it?” put in the alert Gabinius.  “There mustn’t be any clumsy bungling.”

“Rest assured,” said Pratinas, with a grave dignity, perhaps the result of his drinking, “that in my affairs I leave no room for bungling.”

“And your plan is—­” asked Lucius.

“Till to-morrow, friend,” said the Greek; “meet me at the Temple of Saturn, just before dusk.  Then I’ll be ready.”

II

Lucius Ahenobarbus’s servants escorted their tipsy master home to his lodgings in a fashionable apartment house on the Esquiline.  When he awoke, it was late the next day, and head and wits were both sadly the worse for the recent entertainment.  Finally a bath and a luncheon cleared his brain, and he realized his position.  He was on the brink of concocting a deliberate murder.  Drusus had never wronged him; the crime would be unprovoked; avarice would be its only justification.  Ahenobarbus had done many things which a far laxer code of ethics than that of to-day would frown upon; but, as said, he had never committed murder—­at least had only had crucified those luckless slaves, who did not count.  He roused with a start, as from a dream.  What if Pratinas were wrong?  What if there were really gods, and furies, and punishments for the wicked after death?  And then came the other side of the shield:  a great fortune his; all his debts paid off; unlimited chances for self-enjoyment; last, but not least, Cornelia his.  She had slighted him, and turned her back upon all his advances; and now what perfect revenge!  Lucius was more in love with Cornelia than he admitted even to himself.  He would even give up Clyte, if he could possess her.  And so the mental battle went on all day; and the prick of conscience, the fears of superstition, and the lingerings of religion ever grew fainter.  Near nightfall he was at his post, at the Temple of Saturn.  Pratinas was awaiting him.  The Greek had only a few words of greeting, and the curt injunction:—­“Draw your cloak up to shield your face, and follow me.”  Then they passed out from the Forum, forced their way through the crowded streets, and soon were through the Porta Ratumena, outside the walls, and struck out across the Campus Martius, upon the Via Flaminia.  It was rapidly darkening.  The houses grew fewer and fewer.  At a little distance the dim structures of the Portico and Theatre of Pompeius could be seen, looming up to an exaggerated size in the evening haze.  A grey fog was drifting up from the Tiber, and out of a rift in a heavy cloud-bank a beam of the imprisoned moon was struggling.  Along the road were peasants with their carts and asses hastening home.  Over on the Pincian Mount the dark green masses of the splendid gardens of Pompeius and of Lucullus were just visible.  The air was filled with the croak of frogs and the chirp of crickets, and from the river came the creak of the sculls and paddles of a cumbrous barge that was working its way down the Tiber.