Whatever came their way from the
sea for many months had brought them disaster and long since they had
learned to defend themselves. So now, when a party riding at breakneck
speed, bearing with them an old man on whom the inertia of death was
plain, came across the frontiers of their little town, they met them
with the convenient stones of their rocky streets, with their savage,
stark-ribbed dogs, with offal from kitchen heap and donkey stall and
with insults and curses.
"Away, ye bringers of plague! Out, lepers; be gone, ye unclean!"
Laodice and Aquila who rode in the open were fair targets for half the
hail that fell about them. The girl groaned as the missiles fell into
the howdah upon the helpless shape of Costobarus, who did not lift a
hand to fend off the stones. The pagan, bruised and raging, drew his
weapon and spurred his horse to ride down his assailants, but they
scattered before him and from safe refuge continued their assault with
redoubled determination.
Momus, seeing only injury in attempting to enforce hospitality, turned
his camel and, swinging around the outermost limits of the settlement,
fled. Aquila followed him, and a moment later the rest of the party
joined them.
Without the range of the village, the party halted. Momus and Aquila
lifted Costobarus down and laid him on a rug that Laodice had spread
for him.
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