Scene 9

 Pantomalus and Eyewitness

81. WITNESS
Indeed, Pantomalus, how is it going? How is your master doing?

 PANTOMALUS
It's well in so far as you know.

 WITNESS
Therefore he complains.

 PANTOMALUS
Not entirely, thus he may be safe and well disposed towards us.

 WITNESS
By Hercules, however, he is accustomed to being ungrateful.

 PANTOMALUS
What do you think I have become? Thus it possesses things itself. Isn't the sky managed more steadily? The sun, itself, does not always shine.

 WITNESS
Good, our Pantomalus, at last only you say these things on behalf of our masters.

 PANTOMALUS
I say the same thing, for all your absent and present masters.

 WITNESS
I believe you, for, I always believed that you were a good man.

 PANTOMALUS
You make me feel good and you always make me a happy man, you who advises that master of ours well.

WITNESS
I have and always do.

 PANTOMALUS
Ah, would that he preserve your manners being near us as much enduring and yielding as you are with your men!

 WITNESS
I don't agree with these opinions, Pantomalus, you praise us too much.

 PANTOMALUS
By Pollux, we all know and praise most things. And would that all those things happen to you that we young slaves desire.

 WITNESS
No, indeed, for you, by Hercules, whatever you choose for me may happen to your own skin and bones.

 PANTOMALUS
Ah! Thus, why do you suspect it? For you are not burdened by anything, are you?

 WITNESS
No, but it is natural for your servants to have always hated their masters without discrimination.

 PANTOMALUS
The truth is, we curse many men, and often and freely, but these men are cheats and evil as well as you know.

 82. WITNESS
Now, come I believe. But what then were you saying your master did?

 PANTOMALUS
He was beginning a divine ritual. A magician was here with his servants. Then, they all went inside at the same time.

 WITNESS
What, then, is that closed entrance that I see? I believe that they are holding that divine affair in there. Call someone out here.

 PANTOMALUS
Oh, Theocles, Oh Zeta. Someone come here quickly. What then will I say to this? The silence is immense: no one is here.

 WITNESS
The doorkeepers were thus not accustomed to sleeping in that house.

 PANTOMALUS
By Hercules, I believe the measure is by the cause of the unsuitable religions. Letís go to the secret door, which you know well.

 WITNESS
What if the door is closed?

 PANTOMALUS
Lead me not to fear. That is our entrance: it's shut, but it can't shut us out.