'Precisely,' laughed Vacchi.
I followed the men, on my chain tether. So I might dance? So soldiers might draw lots for my use? So I might serve Pietro Vacchi? But what then? Would the man following not 'bide his time' as Tupita had said? Would there not come a time, sooner or later, if he were patient, when he could find me alone? I might even be staked out, my hands and legs widely separated. I had heard mercenaries sometimes enjoyed fastening women down in such a way. But I would be scarcely less helpless if I were in a tiny slave cage, through the bars of which he might thrust with his sword, perhaps a hundred short, sharp times, or, similarly available to him, for whatever he might choose to do to me, chained with my belly to a tree, my ankles and wrists fastened about it.
I looked back in fear.
He was still following!
One stroke of his sword, I knew, if it were his decision to be swift with me, could remove my head.
'I am looking forward to seeing her dance,' said Vacchi.
But I did not even know if he would be swift with me.
'Have you used her?' asked Vacchi.
'Several times,' said Aulus.
'How is she?' asked Vacchi.
'She is a slave,' laughed Aulus.
'Do you recommend her?' asked Vacchi.
'Yes,' said Aulus.
'She is a slave?' said Vacchi.
'She is a superb slave,' said Aulus.
'Excellent!' said Vacchi.
I hoped tat when the men were through with me, the others, and the master, Pietro Vacchi, that they would put me in a slave pen, preferably with other girls. Surely in a camp of mercenaries they would have other girls. Such should be common in such a camp. They would presumably pick them up here and there, perhaps selling some, and adding others. Perhaps some, more beautiful, or popular, might be kept more or less permanently with the troops. Perhaps some of the soldiers, officers probably, even had their own girls, taken here or there, their own property. They had spoken of a 'gentlewoman,' though, I suppose, if she were free, she would not be put with slaves, but might sleep chained at the feet of her captor, at least until her thigh made the acquaintance of the brand and her neck of the collar. Hopefully the bars would be sturdy, and closely set. I would want to sleep near the center of the pen. It would be safer there. Perhaps such things, the presence of other slaves, and of bars of iron, could protect me.
I looked back again. Quietly, implacably, he was following.
I had little doubt he would await his chance.
'Well, Tuka,' said Aulus, looking down at me. 'You are not dallying now.' 'No, Master,' I said.
'One might almost think you were anxious to reach the camp,' he said. 'Yes, Master,' I said.
27 The Pen; Outside the Pen
I lay in the center of the pen.
I was trembling, but here I think I was safe.
I had feared they might not have a pen here, but only a chain, perhaps stretched between trees, that we might be attached to, by the ankle or neck. Such a thing, though it might have its guard, might be more easily approached. The pen was some forty feet square, and some seven feet in height. It had an open roofing of bars, supported by hollow metal posts, and bars, too, covered now with sand, floored it. It could be assembled, fastened together with plates, bolts and chains, and similarly disassembled, and transported in wagons. Mercenaries, following the demands of their business, the exigencies of their trade, frequently move their camps. Though the wagons could doubtless be drawn by tharlarion, if speed were necessary, the harnesses I had seen on the covered harness racks, near the wagons, were not made for tharlarion. They were made for women. Girls, thus, and perhaps some stripped free women among them, would draw the wagons. Doubtless drovers would be with them on the road, with their whips, should they be tempted to lag in their zeal. There were only some twenty or so women penned with me now. Many, perhaps a hundred or more, were doubtless spending the night in the tents of soldiers, signed out to them for the night. There was one gate to our pen. It was secured with two locks, padlocks, and chains. It was guarded by two men.
I rolled over, in the soft sand, lying within the dark blanket.
How pleased I was that there was such a pen.
Here I was safe, I was sure.
I had no doubt of the menace and intent of he who had followed us back to the camp of Pietro Vacchi. He had been making his way, meaningfully, the blade in its sheath, toward Venna, and the black chain. It had been his intent, sooner or later, in one way or another, to renew his acquaintance with a certain slave, one who had once betrayed him. then he had recognized her on the road. He had then immediately changed his route. Did they really think he had not known his way to Brundisium, a native of Brundisium, and such a man? Did they really think he had returned to the camp only to make a fresh start in the morning? No, he had been following us for a purpose, and it had to do with a slave, one he was determined to bring within the reach of his hand, and blade. Had I had any doubt he had recognized me on the road, and that that had been responsible for his change of direction, that doubt had been dispelled in the camp. When I had knelt before a post, my hands behind me, chained back about the post, a helmet beside me, set in the sand, like a vessel, into which ostraka would be placed, men had come to look upon me. They had come to see if they thought it worth their while, in the spending of their evening, to wait about for a time, to see me dance, and then, perhaps, if they were pleased, to drop an ostrakan into the helmet. Among them came he whom I most feared. I strained forward, trying to kiss at his legs, but the chain on my wrists, pulling against the back of the post, held me back. I then realized that he had selected the place where he had stood with care. He had judged the distance with cruel exactness. It was such that I would try to reach him, desperately, to kiss him, to placate him. It was also such that I would be unable to do so. I had looked up into his eyes, and then, in terror, had put down my head. He had then left me, and another man had come to look upon me. I had danced that night between campfires, for the mercenaries. He had not chosen to watch. It seems, once again, that he would take suitable precautions, not be softened, that the iron of his intent be neither diminished nor imperiled, that there be no possible weakening of his terrible resolve.
I turned to my back, within the blanket. It was a very dark night. I could scarcely see the bars, it was so dark.
I think the mercenaries had found me pleasing. Surely they had responded well to the dance, and the helmet had been filled with ostraka. It had not started well, for I had been hampered by terror, but soon, as I recalled my earlier beating by Aulus, and knew I might be again whipped if I did not do well, and as I reassured myself that within the camp I would presumably be safe, and as I saw the men, and I knew they wished pleasure, and that it was within my power to give it to them, and abundantly, and must do so, to the best of my power. I began to lose my terror and then, at last, I think. I danced well. 'Superb!' I heard cry. Far then I was from the shy, introverted girl of the library, she who had scarcely dared to admit, even to herself, even in the concealments of her most secret heart, that in her belly lurked the dispositions and nature of a pleasure slave! But now, openly, and whether she willed it or not, she was that very slave. 'Superb!' cried another man. I danced, barefoot in the sand, naked, in my collar, my body illuminated redly in the light of the fires. I was joyful, a woman! How powerful, and grand, were the men! How I wanted to please them, and knew that I must. They did not fear, or object to, masculine power. They delighted in it, reveled in it. It ennobled and exalted them. It made them great! It made them glorious! And had they not been such men, how could I have been such a woman?
It was very dark out.
Afterwards when the five ostraka had been drawn something of my fears had returned. I had even begged two of the fellows not to take me far from the fires, but, dragged by the hair, bent over, I had followed them. Then I had served them in the darkness, between tents. Once, my hands over my head, I had felt the tent ropes. Once, when I had bent over one fellow, I had lifted my head, in terror, thinking I might have heard a sound, but, it
