I stared
puzzled and groping in my mind. But I felt no emotion as I stared and
peered at him.
Oddly enough, from the moment when I received Vedia's letter of warning
until I caught sight of the head of the procession about to enter the
Circus through the Procession gate, I had had not one instant of
despondency or of self-pity. But, at sight of the head of that magnificent
procession, a sort of wave of misery surged through me and inundated me
with a sudden sense of wistful regret for all that I had lost and also
with an acute realization of the precarious hold I had on life, of the
peril I was in from hour to hour. This unexpected and unwelcome dejection
possessed me until the whole line of floats displaying the images of the
gods had passed and the racing chariots came along.
The very first of these drawn by a splendid team of four dapple grays, was
driven by a charioteer wearing the colors of the Crimsons' Company. I did
not need to hear the exclamation of Colgius:
"There is Palus! That is Palus!" to recognize this Prince of Charioteers.
The descriptions I had heard were enough to have told me who he was. For
at even a distant sight of him I did not wonder at the tales which gave
out that he was a half brother of Commodus, or Commodus in disguise.
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