EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS
“What are you talking about?” snapped Validus. “Quick, out with it!”
“There is a stranger in Castrum, Mare who claims to be a barbarian from Germania, but I believe him to be a spy from Castrum Sanguinarius where, it is said, Cassius Hasta is an honored guest of Sublatus, in that city.”
“What do you know about Cassius Hasta and what has he to do with it?” demanded Validus.
“It is said—it is rumored,” stammered Fulvus Fupus, “that—”
“I have heard too many rumors already about Cassius Hasta,” exclaimed Validus. “Can I not dispatch my nephew upon a mission without every fool in Castrum Mare lying awake nights to conjure motives, which may later be ascribed to me.”
“It is only what I heard,” said Fulvus, flushed and uncomfortable. “I do not know anything about it. I did not say that I knew.”
“Well, what did you hear?” demanded Validus. “Come, out with it.”
“The talk is common in the Baths that you sent Cassius Hasta away because he was plotting treason and that he went at once to Sublatus, who received him in a friendly fashion and that together they are planning an attack upon Castrum Mare.”
Validus scowled. “Baseless rumor,” he said; “but what about this prisoner? What has he to do with it and why have I not been advised of his presence?”
“That I do not know,” said Fulvus Fupus. “That is why I felt it doubly my duty to inform you, since the man who is harboring the stranger is a most powerful patrician and one who might well be ambitious.”
“Who is he?” asked the Emperor.
“Septimus Favonius,” replied Fupus.
“Septimus Favonius!” exclaimed Validus. “Impossible.”
“Not so impossible,” said Fupus, boldly, “if glorious Caesar will but recall the friendship that ever existed between Cassius Hasta and Mallius Lepus, the nephew of Septimus Favonius. The home of Septimus Favonius was the other
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