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When they let her go she reared, bucked, dashed about, bucked again and again, and continued till exhaustion forced her to quiet down and obey her rider, who had kept his seat from the first. "What do you think of that, Felix?" the Villicus asked me. "As good horse-wrangling as can be seen anywhere," I replied. "Up to standard and even above normal. But I can do better."
I was on terms of comradeship with all my fellow-slaves, of easy sociability with the yeomanry; while I was treated by the overseers, the Villicus, and inspectors with marked consideration. Thus I rapidly learnt all there was to know of the idiosyncrasies of the locality, since everybody seemed to trust me and no one held aloof or was reticent with me.
We trooped off to a pen where there was a fine breeding-bull all alone. "Get inside, lad!" said the Villicus; "that is, if you dare. But be sure you are ready to vault out again, and entirely able to clear the pen." I climbed into the pen and stood. The bull gazed at me, but made no threatening movement and his demeanor was placid.
On the third day the Villicus chided me for having told my name to the sub-procurator after I had recaged the panther. "An Imperial courier has just passed," he said. "He is a close friend of a trusty friend of mine in Rome. Like most couriers he is obliging and will carry letters for his friends, even packets. He dropped here a note for me, warning me that I am likely to lose you.
The villicus had been once the mere intendant of the estate on which his master lived; he was now sole manager of a vast domain for his absent lord, sole keeper of the great ergastulum which enclosed at nightfall the instruments of labour and disgorged them at daybreak over the fields.
I then felt safe to ask what had become of Vedia, her name being known from her advertisement. He said she had procured horses and mules and had returned to Rome, sending up agents from Nuceria to negotiate with the bandits, rescue Lydia and pay her ransom. The next day, at dawn, I set off with the beast-train, riding by the procurator. He and I and the Villicus had had a talk.
I gentled colt after colt all that day till sunset, with a very brief pause for food and rest. Also I kept it up next day until mid-afternoon, when the last colt had been tamed. Then, as we stood breathing, one of the horse-wranglers suggested: "Try him on Selinus." "That would be plain murder," one of the others cried. "I am not so sure," the Villicus ruminated.
Also I, when the time came, removed combs from such hives as she designated. Spring was in its full glory and I felt the exhilaration of it. Each home- coming was a delight. And I was much away, for the Villicus had me convoyed about the countryside to every estate which possessed an unbroken colt or an intractable horse. I gentled successfully every one I encountered.
But I realized that Bulla's admirers or the agents of the King of the Highwaymen would make an end of me long before Vedia's influence could obtain my manumission; and that, if she did accomplish all she expected, I could never hope to escape the vigilance of the tenacious and expert pursuers who would inevitably dog my footsteps. I thought the advice of the Villicus good.
I can walk right out into that bunch of colts, catch any young stallion you point out, hold him by the nose, gentle him without any rope or thong on him, mount him by vaulting onto his back, and ride him about unbitted, unbridled, bareback, and as I please, without his rearing or backing or kicking." "Son," said the Villicus, "you are either a lunatic or a demigod.
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