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My nine farmer-tenants were all present, all pathetically and touchingly glad to see me again about, even old Chryseros Philargyrus. They had a petition to prefer, namely, that I should give them permission to leave Rome and return home, jointly and severally, just as soon as they pleased.
We talked in subdued tones, as before, and kept it up until long after dark. Next morning I woke full of hope and eager to be off. Chryseros brought our wallets and we packed them with everything they were to hold except most of the food. We had a long wrangle over the money, as Chryseros wanted to force on us more silver than I thought it safe to carry.
I slept well and woke feeling almost myself, with merely trifling discomfort from my fast healing wounds. When Chryseros returned in the dusk, I ate ravenously. He brought us good, coarse tunics and cloaks, also hats, shoes, and belts; and for each of us, a small leather case containing two good needles and a little hank of strong linen thread.
According to Chryseros, Gratillus had made no great effort to find me, since, in fact, neither he nor anyone connected with the government had had any suspicion that I had returned home. He had merely made a perfunctory investigation to assure himself, as he thought, that I had not so returned.
I felt utterly despairing and totally reckless. This mood, oddly enough, urged me to do the very best thing I could have done. Either from right instinct or delirious folly, I informed Chryseros fully of our purposes, doings and plans. He apologized to Agathemer for his assault on him, affirmed his complete loyalty to me and promised all possible assistance and perfect secrecy.
The points of the bull's horns were driven into the wood of the barn and the horns were so long that Chryseros was in no immediate danger of being crushed between the bull's forehead and the barn wall. The bull was so enraged that he was pushing with all his might, puffing and bellowing, spraying Chryseros' legs with froth, grunting and lowing between bellows.
In the chests Agathemer found other tunics, warmer than those they had on when we came, which were suited to them. But there were no cloaks small enough for them to wear. With our precious scissors Agathemer cut in two the smallest warm cloak he could find and, with the needles and thread Chryseros had given us, he roughly hemmed the cut edge.
As if I had been then what I had been ten days before, I ordered Chryseros to loose Agathemer and he obeyed me, as if I had been what I felt myself, his master.
Chryseros had confirmed our instinctive opinion that, as Sabines, we should be much less likely to arouse suspicion in Umbria and the Po Valley than in Samnium, Lucania or Bruttium. We had never thought of escape southward; northward we had meant to work our way, from the instant of conceiving the idea of escaping. But we had no settled, coherent plan as to how to achieve safety and keep alive.
"Old Love-Gold Love-Silver," Tanno commented, "is that a nickname or is it really his name?" "Really his name," I affirmed. "His mother was so extravagant and wasteful that his father named him Chryseros Philargyrus as a sort of antidote incantation, in the hope that it might prove a good omen of his disposition and predispose him to parsimony.
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