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Show Ill And when that night he closed his eyes in sleep, succumbing to the aches of day's long march, he dreamed himself about a special queen, the magic Is is whom Apuleius described to him: she rose quite slowly from the patient sea, her face so beautiful that gods like boats in wind would move at her command. Her body shone atop the sea's bright waves, her long thick hair in ringlets fell and fluttered on her,finely tapered neck; a flowered garland circled her gentle crown; her torso robe cascaded to her knees. She smiled at him, then unexpectedly she sank back to the sea, and he awoke in perspiration and a seasalt taste upon his tongue as dawn began to stalk just like a tyrant with a flaming sword. The guarding of the ganaries was dull, but orderly at hospital was worse. He waited for gymnasium, duty or special times for washing at the baths... and something always unpredictable at depot of the works-especially the time when Nepos fell into the pit where tar was stirred; or when the foreman of the quarries slipped on oxen dung. A chargin^'boar, the sign of Legion XX had gored a camp worker upon the dock while he was loading ship last week and knocked four crates into the river's mud before his -javelin had pierced its bristled side. IV The vessel's single passenger had come from Rome by way of Nice in Gaul with messages for legates and tribunes of all Britannia. He said his name was Amphibalus. His mien was kind but firm, and when he spoke to the tent group about Rome's revised rites, then Alban thought he heard a touch of scepticism in his voice so sympathetic to his own. He asked to speak with him in private talk because as standard-bearer he was held accountable for the bronze image of the emperor. Yet as he spoke about the news from Rome, this Amphibalus drew a fish sign in the clay beneath his feet. |