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Updated: June 22, 2025


I was, when I shot its bolts, altogether out of sight of Vedia, Nemestronia and the other noble ladies who had been spectators of my tussle with the leopard.

Agathemer took off his robe, and threw it around me and led me to a postern. In the vaulted corridor we were met by Tanno, who embraced me and congratulated me, and Galen, who also embraced me and felicitated me. Tanno said: "Vedia kept up till Agathemer nabbed the criminals, then she fainted; but she declares the faint relieved her and that she is entirely herself."

Together we spent five dreadful days in the darkness, dampness, chill and foulness of that tiny cell. I found that influence such as Tanno and Vedia possessed and cash such as they had at their disposal, could do much even for the occupant of such a cell, destined to such a doom.

Ridiculously, what passed through my mind, besides disgust at the foul odor of the quilt about my head, was the thought that, if I had known that ferocious beasts would avoid me even when they could not see my gaze, I should, on that unforgettable moonlit evening in Sabinum, have gone off home to my cottage, to Septima, and have missed my encounter with Vedia, and our night in her traveling coach.

I could see that Tanno's jesting replies to the Satronians he had met on the road had given them the idea that Xantha was being conveyed, in a shut litter, to Villa Vedia: similarly his quizzical words to the Vedians he had met had given them a similar notion that Greia was being smuggled behind slid panels and drawn curtains, to Villa Satronia.

I could but conjecture that all my letters had miscarried. Meanwhile, besides being reminded of it each time I wrote to Tanno or Vedia, I did not forget that I was a proscribed fugitive, my life forfeit if I were detected. I conceived that my best disguise was to dress, act and talk as much as possible in the character of dilettante art expert and music-lover, which I had assumed.

That Agathemer's presumption should have spoiled the interview with Vedia which she and Nemestronia had manifestly arranged for us, that it should have exposed Vedia in her undignified disguise to recognition by the greatest ass and blatherskite in the senate, this infuriated me till I felt internally like Aetna or Vesuvius on the verge of eruption.

The distant formality of her address, her disdainful tone, the affront of her words, chilled me like a dash of cold water. "Caia!" I stammered, "Vedia, I mean. What has happened? What is wrong?"

He has come to Villa Occidental to propose to General Vedia the formation of a military corps, of which he shall be chief, composed of his old companions-in-arms, to serve against the Indians of Gran Chaco. He explains his plan with much enthusiasm, and then begs our traveler to present him with his gun, his revolver, his money, his hat, and even his boots.

These are my slaves, put at your disposal and enjoined to obey you as they would obey me in person. Keep quiet here till I can arrange for you to take possession of your legacies from Falco. I think he left you all your personal belongings and the slaves who waited on you. As soon as the necessary formalities are completed I'll send them to you. "Do not attempt to communicate with Vedia or Tanno.

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