Olbasanus nodded with the quiet formality of a man accustomed to such phrases, and allowed himself to be conducted to the large sitting-room under the columns of the peristyle, where Lydia, reclining on a brass lounge, awaited him.
As he crossed the threshold the young Sicilian rose, greeted him with great embarrassment, and requested him to follow her.
Behind the sitting-room was a windowless, oval _exedra_[7] lighted from above--the apartment specially designed for the social chat so greatly prized and enjoyed by the Romans even in later times.
Into this cosy private room Lydia conducted the smiling Oriental, who read in her timid confusion assurance of victory won and fresh triumphs for the future.
But scarcely had the folding doors closed behind Olbasanus, when from the opposite ones three strong Germans rushed in and seized him as a pack of hounds fall upon a wolf. Spite of his desperate resistance, he was bound; a gag, thrust by the flaxen-haired Frieselanders between his jaws, barely allowed him to breathe.
At the same time Caius Bononius and the centurion Philippus entered the _exedra_ by a side door.
“Why do you roll your eyes so, conjuror of Hecate?” said Bononius. “It will be an easy matter for the confidant of all the spirits of the Upper and Lower World to burst these bonds asunder and hurl the criminals who have assailed him lifeless on the floor.”
Spite of the defiant scorn these words were intended to express, the young man’s voice had trembled. The glances that flashed from under the Oriental’s lashes were so fierce and diabolical, and the memory of the events in the enchanter’s house on the Quirinal so fresh, that Bononius could not without emotion see the conquered man at his feet,--for in the struggle with the slaves Olbasanus had sunk upon his knees.
At a sign from the centurion Philippus, the flaxen-haired Frieselanders now retired through the same door by which they had entered. He himself approached the fettered captive, drew his sword from its sheath, and said in curt, resolute tones:
“You have been guilty of an execrable crime. Recognize in me a commander of the armed body appointed to guard the welfare of the citizens. I could arrest you now without ceremony. Your fate would be undoubted; since, apart from your offence against Lucius Rutilius and Heliodorus’s daughter, the edicts of former emperors, prohibiting Chaldeans and mathematicians a residence in the seven-hilled city on pain of death, are still in force. That the authorities have been negligent in executing these edicts; that an indulgence has prevailed of whose injurious results you are the best proof, has little to do with the matter. Yet,--spite of your criminality, I will exercise mercy, if you will punctiliously fulfil two conditions that I shall impose. If you wish to hear them, give me some sign!”