Volume Ii Part 12 (2/2)

”Well? and still no news from Ravenna, or from Rome?”

”None! Yesterday I sent off my fifth messenger.”

”May G.o.d destroy our King! Listen, Totila, I don't believe we shall ever get alive out of these worm-eaten walls.”

”Nor I either,” said Totila quietly, and offered his guest a cup of wine.

Uliaris looked at him; then he drank and said:

”Dear fellow! thou art pure as gold, and thy Caecubian too. And if I must die here, like an old bear amongst the dogs--I am at least glad that I have learned to know thee so well; thee and thy Caecubian.”

With this rough but friendly speech the grey old Goth left the s.h.i.+p.

Totila sent corn and wine to the garrison in the castle, with which the soldiers regaled themselves far into the night.

But the next morning, when Uliaris looked forth from the tower of the castle, he rubbed his eyes. For on the battery upon the hill waved the blue flag of the Goths.

Totila had landed in the night in the rear of the enemy, and had taken the works by storm.

But this new act of audacity only increased the anger of Belisarius. He swore to make an end of the troublesome boats at any price. To his great joy the four triremes from Sicily just then appeared in the offing. Belisarius ordered that they should at once force their way into the harbour of Neapolis, and spoil the handiwork of ”those pirates.” On the evening of the same day the four immense s.h.i.+ps cast anchor at the entrance of the harbour. Belisarius himself visited the coast with his followers, and rejoiced at the sight of the sails, gilded by the evening sun.

”The rising sun shall see them inside the harbour, in spite of that bold youth,” he said to Antonina, who accompanied him, and turned his dappled-greys back to the camp.

The next morning he had not yet left his camp-bed--Procopius was standing near him, reading the sketch of a report to Justinian--when Chanaranzes, the Persian, the leader of the body-guard, entered the tent, and cried: ”The s.h.i.+ps, general! the s.h.i.+ps are taken!”

Belisarius sprang from his couch in a rage.

”He dies who says it!”

”It would be better,” observed Procopius, ”that he should die who did it!”

”Who was it?”

”Oh, sir, the young Goth with the sparkling eyes and s.h.i.+ning hair!”

”Totila!” exclaimed Belisarius, ”Totila, again!”

”The crew were lying, partly on sh.o.r.e with my outposts, partly on deck, sound asleep. Suddenly, at midnight, all around became as lively as if a hundred s.h.i.+ps had risen out of the sea.”

”A hundred s.h.i.+ps! Ten nutsh.e.l.ls!”

”In a moment, long before we could come to their help from the sh.o.r.e, the s.h.i.+ps were boarded, the crews taken prisoners, one of the triremes, whose cable could not be cut quickly enough, set on fire, and the others towed off to Neapolis!”

”Your s.h.i.+ps have entered the harbour sooner than you expected, O Belisarius,” observed Procopius.

But Belisarius had recovered his self-control.

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