The Roman Traitor (Vol. 1 of 2) - The UK Mirror Service

THE MEN 15
close to the body and within arm's length of the fierce Cethegus,
whose attention was for the moment distracted from his watch
by the catastrophe which had befallen his companion. Dodging
by a quick movement—so quick that it seemed almost the result
of instinct—so to elude the swift attempt of his enemy to arrest
his progress, the spy was forced to rush almost into the arms of
Cassius.
Yet this appeared not to cause him any apprehension; for he
dashed boldly on, till they were almost front to front; when,
notwithstanding his unwieldy frame and inactivity of habit,
spurred into something near to energy by the very imminence
of peril, the worn-out debauchee bestirred himself as if to seize
him.
If such, however, were his intention, widely had he miscalculated
his own powers, and fatally underrated the agility and
strength of the stranger—a tall, thin, wiry man, well nigh six feet
in height, broad shouldered, and deep chested, and thin flanked,
and limbed like a Greek Athlete.
On he dashed!—on—right on! till they stood face to face;
and then with one quick blow, into which, as it seemed, he put
but little of his strength, he hurled the burly Cassius to the earth,
and fled with swift and noiseless steps into the deepest gloom.
Perceiving on the instant the necessity of apprehending this now
undoubted spy, the fiery Cethegus paused not one instant to look
after his discomfited companions; but rushed away on the traces
of the fugitive, who had perhaps gained, at the very utmost, a [22]
dozen paces' start of him, in that wild midnight race—that race
for life and death.
The slave, for such from his dark tunic he appeared to me,
was evidently both a swift and practised runner; and well aware
how great a stake was on his speed he now strained every muscle
to escape, while scarce less fleet, and straining likewise every
sinew to the utmost, Cethegus panted at his very heels.
Before, however, they had run sixty yards, one swifter than