"Have a care, O Rufinus," said the Palmyrean boldly, "choose wiser words if you would have peaceful ways. Palmyra brooks no such slander of her foremost men."
"And Rome brooks no such men as you, traitor," said Rufinus. "Ay, traitor, I say!" he repeated, as Odænathus started at the word. "Think not to hide your plots to overthrow the Roman power in your city and hand the rule to the base Sapor of Persia. Every thing is known to our great father the Emperor, and thus doth he reckon with traitors. Macrinus, strike!" and at his word the short Gallic sword in the ready hand of the big German foot-soldier went straight to its mark and Odænathus, the "head-man" of Palmyra, lay dead in the Street of the Thousand Columns.
So sudden and so unexpected was the blow that the Palmyreans stood as if stunned, unable to comprehend what had happened. But the Roman was swift to act.
"Sound, trumpets! Down, pikes!" he cried, and as the trumpet peal rose loud and clear, fresh legionaries came hurrying through the Damascus arch, and the pilum[1] and spatha of Rome bore back the shields and lances of Palmyra.
But, before the lowered pikes could fully disperse
- ↑ The pilum was the Roman pike, and the spatha the short single-edged Roman sword.
