Moors also following him, led by Coutzinas.  And after passing by the city of Hadrumetum, they came upon their opponents somewhere near there, and making a camp a little apart from the enemy, they passed the night.  And on the day after that John and Ulitheus, with a detachment of the army, remained there, while Artabanes and Coutzinas led their army against their opponents.  And the Moors under Antalas did not withstand their attack and rushed off in flight.  But Artabanes of a sudden wilfully played the coward, and turning his standard about marched off towards the rear.  For this reason Ulitheus was purposing to kill him when he came into the camp.  But Artabanes, by way of excusing himself, said he feared lest Marcentius, coming to assist the enemy from the city of Hadrumetum, where he then happened to be, would do his forces irreparable harm; but Gontharis, he said, ought to march against the enemy with the whole army.  And at first he considered going to Hadrumetum with his followers and uniting with the emperor’s forces.  But after long deliberation it seemed to him better to put Gontharis out of the world and thus free both the emperor and Libya from a difficult situation.  Returning, accordingly, to Carthage, he reported to the tyrant that he would need a larger army to meet the enemy.  And Gontharis, after conferring with Pasiphilus, consented, indeed, to equip his whole army, but purposed to place a guard in Carthage, and in person to lead the army against the enemy.  Each day, therefore, he was destroying many men toward whom he felt any suspicion, even though groundless.  And he gave orders to Pasiphilus, whom he was intending to appoint in charge of the garrison of Carthage, to kill all the Greeks[74] without any consideration.

XXVIII

And after arranging everything else in the very best way, as it seemed to him, Gontharis decided to entertain his friends at a banquet, with the intention of making his departure on the following day.  And in a room where there were in readiness three couches which had been there from ancient times, he made the banquet.  So he himself reclined, as was natural, upon the first couch, where were also Athanasius and Artabanes, and some of those known to Gontharis, and Peter, a Thracian by birth, who had previously been a body-guard of Solomon.  And on both the other couches were the first and noblest of the Vandals.  John, however, who commanded the mutineers of Stotzas; was entertained by Pasiphilus in his own house, and each of the other leaders wherever it suited the several friends of Gontharis to entertain them.  Artabanes, accordingly, when he was bidden to this banquet, thinking that this occasion furnished him a suitable opportunity for the murder of the tyrant, was planning to carry out his purpose.  He therefore disclosed the matter to Gregorius and to Artasires and three other body-guards, bidding the body-guards get inside the hall with their