candlesticks.  The Roman-born officers rather looked down on us for doing this, but we preferred the heather to their amusements.  Believe me,’ Parnesius turned again to Dan, ’a boy is safe from all things that really harm when he is astride a pony or after a deer.  Do you remember, O Faun,’—­he turned to Puck—­’the little altar I built to the Sylvan Pan by the pine-forest beyond the brook?’

‘Which?  The stone one with the line from Xenophon?’ said Puck, in quite a new voice.

’No!  What do I know of Xenophon?  That was Pertinax—­after he had shot his first mountain-hare with an arrow—­by chance!  Mine I made of round pebbles, in memory of my first bear.  It took me one happy day to build.’  Parnesius faced the children quickly.

’And that was how we lived on the Wall for two years—­a little scuffling with the Picts, and a great deal of hunting with old Allo in the Pict country.  He called us his children sometimes, and we were fond of him and his barbarians, though we never let them paint us Pict fashion.  The marks endure till you die.’

‘How’s it done?’ said Dan.  ‘Anything like tattooing?’

’They prick the skin till the blood runs, and rub in coloured juices.  Allo was painted blue, green, and red from his forehead to his ankles.  He said it was part of his religion.  He told us about his religion (Pertinax was always interested in such things), and as we came to know him well, he told us what was happening in Britain behind the Wall.  Many things took place behind us in those days.  And by the Light of the Sun,’ said Parnesius, earnestly, ’there was not much that those little people did not know!  He told me when Maximus crossed over to Gaul, after he had made himself Emperor of Britain, and what troops and emigrants he had taken with him.  We did not get the news on the Wall till fifteen days later.  He told me what troops Maximus was taking out of Britain every month to help him to conquer Gaul; and I always found the numbers were as he said.  Wonderful!  And I tell another strange thing!’

He joined his hands across his knees, and leaned his head on the curve of the shield behind him.

’Late in the summer, when the first frosts begin and the Picts kill their bees, we three rode out after wolf with some new hounds.  Rutilianus, our General, had given us ten days’ leave, and we had pushed beyond the Second Wall—­beyond the Province of Valentia—­into the higher hills, where there are not even any of old Rome’s ruins.  We killed a she-wolf before noon, and while Allo was skinning her he looked up and said to me, “When you are Captain of the Wall, my child, you won’t be able to do this any more!”

’I might as well have been made Prefect of Lower Gaul, so I laughed and said, “Wait till I am Captain.”

’"No, don’t wait,” said Allo.  “Take my advice and go home—­both of you.”

’"We have no homes,” said Pertinax.  “You know that as well as we do.  We’re finished men—­thumbs down against both of us.  Only men without hope would risk their necks on your ponies.”  The old man laughed one of those short Pict laughs—­like a fox barking on a frosty night.  “I’m fond of you two,” he said.  “Besides, I’ve taught you what little you know about hunting.  Take my advice and go home.”