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.but how far did she dare let that proceed, and once started, how could shestop it?"I'll walk you to your tent," he said, rising."Tomorrow, I'll introduce youto my engineers, who will show you anything you want to know about ballistaeand the rest."* * *That night it rained again, and the next day hardly dawned at all.The gradualtransition from black night to gray day crept over the camp unnoticed even bythe birds, which forgot to announce the new day at all.When at last the guardcaptain could distinguish a black thread from a white one, he ordered a hornblown, and sodden men emerged from their tents, then struggled to light firesunder water-soaked faggots, to break their fasts.True to his promise, Calvinus introduced Pierrette to his chief engineer, butas there was little to show her but unhewn logs, she did not spend much timewith him, in the drizzling rain.She soon sought outPolybius, who had sensibly stayed in the snug stone house, and had lit severallamps to ward off the gloom."I've been giving your ideas a good going-over," he said, as they sipped hotbarley-and-bean soup."When I consider my own books again, one flaw that rises up and beats me isthe nature of fate, and its proper relationship with history.If my successorsfind aught to criticize but my inconsistencies regarding Tyche's role orFortuna's, to use her Roman name they will have plenty to say.""Calvinus believes in the goddess," Pierrette reflected, remembering the lightin his pale blue eyes."All soldiers worship her," Polybius responded, "because no one has botheredto define just what is meant by luck, chance, fate, and caprice.That, too, ismy own failure.When a great general succeeds as did Hannibal, bringing hismen and thirty-seven elephants all the way from Iberia to the outskirts ofRoma, we say Fortuna aided him but was the goddess even consulted?""I think that careful planning, like researching his possible routes, and thealliances he made in advance with the Gallic tribes whose territory he had tocross, were more important," Pierrette stated.file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Douglas,%20L%20Warren%20-.l%20Of%20Tears%20(chunky%20HTML)/0671319973__24.htm (4 of 9)2-1-2007 14:13:18- Chapter 24"Exactly! His `good fortune' was his own doing, and Roma's subsequent `badluck' resulted from that.But some `lucky' events are less subject to analysis the flash flood thatdelays an army, for instance, and changes the outcome of a battle.Must weattribute such to the goddess's hand at work?"The discussion of fate occupied them for much of the gloomy day, and resultedin a short list of examples.Polybius praised Pierrette's fine handwriting,which was much neater than his cramped, elderly style, "Though you have an oddway of making your `sigmas,' when they occur at the end of a word."Pierrette's Greek was the cursive style, used for manuscripts, not therectilinear capitals seen on monuments, and it had been learned from documentsrecopied and "updated" many times since they were first written.At last the old man pleaded fatigue, and Pierrette did not regret it she hadnot really convinced him of anything, or persuaded him to throw the weight ofhis opinion behind her demand that Calvinus engage the Gauls without delay,but she was sure Polybius now considered her a mind worth reckoning with, andwhen the time was right, she would test his own mind's flexibility, buthopefully not beyond its limits.Page 138ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html* * *With Guihen, she ate yesterday's bread, dipped in a stew of dried beans andlentils, flavored (ever so slightly) with salted pork.The elfin one, slippingin and out of the camp with almost-supernatural ease, had found an entire hamin the smoky rafters of a Gaulish farmstead not a mile from the Roman gate.Gaulish hams had been famous for centuries, even in Roma.It would keepindefinitely, even though it would begin to mold in the rainy weather
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