Berenike gave the soldier her hand, thanked him hurriedly, and begged him, as he could pass unharmed through the city, to hasten to her husband’s counting-house by the water-side, to warn him and carry him her last greetings.

With tears in his eyes Martialis did as she desired.  When he had gone, the steward began to implore his mistress to conceal herself, and not cast away God’s gift of life so sinfully; but she turned from him resolutely though kindly, and repaired once more to the brothers’ room.

One glance at them disclosed to her that they had come to no definite conclusion; but their hesitation vanished as soon as they heard that the centurion was ready to draw his sword upon the emperor when they should give the signal; and Berenike breathed a sigh of relief at this resolution, and clasped their hands in gratitude.

They, too, implored her to conceal herself, but she merely answered: 

“May your youth grow into happy old age!  Life can offer me nothing more, since my child was taken from me—­But time presses—­I welcome the murderers, now that I know that revenge will not sleep.”

“And your husband?” interposed Nemesianus.

She answered with a bitter smile:  “He?  He has the gift of being easily consoled.—­But what was that?”

Loud voices were audible outside the sick-room.  Nemesianus stationed himself in front of the lady, sword in hand.  This protection, however, proved unnecessary, for, instead of the praetorians, Johanna entered the room, supporting on her arm the half-sinking form of a young man in whom no one would have recognized the once beautifully curled and carefully dressed Alexander.  A long caracalla covered his tall form; Dido the slave had cut off his hair, and he himself had disguised his features with streaks of paint.  A large, broad-brimmed hat had slipped to the back of his head like a drunken man’s, and covered a wound from which the red blood flowed down upon his neck.  His whole aspect breathed pain and horror, and Berenike, who took him for a hired cut-throat sent by Caracalla, retreated hastily from him till Johanna revealed his name.

He nodded his head in confirmation, and then sank exhausted on his knees beside Apollinaris’s couch and managed with great difficulty to stammer out:  “I am searching for Philip.  He went into the town-ill-out of his senses.  Did he not come to you?”

“No,” answered Berenike.  “But what is this fresh blood?  Has the slaughter begun?”

The wounded man nodded.  Then he continued, with a groan:  “In front of the house of your neighbor Milon—­the back of my head—­I fled—­a lance—­”

His voice failed him, and Berenike cried to the tribune:  “Support him, Nemesianus!  Look after him and tend him.  He is the brother of the maiden—­you know—­If I know you, you will do all in your power for him, and keep him hidden here till all danger is over.”

“We will defend him with our lives!” cried Apollinaris, giving his hand to the lady.