covered with furs sat a man of middle age, robust, fair-complexioned, with a keen look in his pale blue eyes and something of the wolfish about his mouth.  Bessas had long ago given proof of valour, and enjoyed repute as a general, but since his holding command in Rome, his vices, chief of which was avarice, showed much more prominently than the virtues which had advanced him; he used the Imperial authority chiefly to enrich himself, in this respect, it is true, merely acting in harmony with the Emperor’s representative at Ravenna, and with:  the other Greek generals scattered about Italy, but exhibiting in his methods a shrewdness and an inhumanity not easily rivalled.  Behind his chair stood several subordinates, and on a stool before him sat a noble recently arrived as envoy from Byzantium.

Having been previously instructed as to his behaviour in this redoubtable presence, Basil followed the example of Marcian in approaching with bent head to within a distance of three paces, then dropping to his knees, and bowing so as almost to touch the ground with his forehead.  He heard a gruff voice command him to rise.

‘So this is the heir of the Senator Maximus,’ said Bessas, much as he might have spoken of viewing a horse that interested him.  ’What is his name?’

‘Basilius, my lord,’ replied Marcian, with grave respect.

’And what is he doing?  Why does not a limber lad like that serve the Emperor?’

’Your Magnanimity will recollect that the lord Basil had permission to attend Maximus into Campania, whence he is but now returned.’

‘Can’t he speak for himself?’ growled Bessas, turning sharply upon Marcian.  ’You have a tongue, lord Basil?  Do you only use it among the wenches?’

A subdued laugh sounded behind the commander’s chair.  The envoy from Byzantium showed more discreet appreciation of the jest.  And Basil, his head bowed, would fain have concealed a face burning with angry shame.

‘I will do my best,’ he replied in a steady voice, ’to answer any question your excellence may put to me.’

‘Come, that’s better,’ said the general, with that affectation of bluff good-nature which always veiled his designs.  ’I like the look of you, my good Basil; who knows but we may be friends?  By the bye, was there not some special reason for your coming to see me?’

‘Your excellence summoned me.’

‘Yes, yes, I remember.  That affair of the Gothic wench.’  Bessas checked himself, glanced at the envoy, and corrected his phrase.  ’The Gothic lady, I would say, who has somehow been spirited out of sight.  What can you tell us of her, lord Basil?  It has been whispered to me that if you cannot lead us to this beauty’s hiding-place, nobody can.’