Part 12 (2/2)

From what Calvus told me in Rome, Curio and certain other still worse _Populares_[81] were trying to induce you to join their abominable faction. I trust you gave those men no encouragement?”

[81] The party in opposition, since the time of Tiberius Gracchus, to the Senate party--Optimates; at this time the _Populares_ were practically all Caesarians.

Drusus was evidently confused. He was wis.h.i.+ng strongly that Cornelia was away, and he could talk to her uncle with less constraint. He felt that he was treading on very dangerous ground.

”It is true,” said he, trying painfully to answer as if the words cost him no thought. ”Antonius had met many of my father's old comrades in Gaul, and they had sent a number of kind messages to me. Then, too, Balbus invited me to a dinner-party and there I met Curio, and a very pleasant time we had. I cannot recall that they made any special efforts to enlist me as a partisan.”

In this last, Drusus spoke truly; for he had already thrown in his lot with the Caesarian cause. But Lentulus knew enough of the case to realize that he was receiving not the whole truth but only a half; and being a man of a sharp temper that was under very imperfect control, threw diplomacy to the winds, and replied vehemently: ”Don't attempt to cover up your folly! I know how you have put yourself in the power of those conspirators. Are you planning to turn out another Catilina?”

”My dear sir,” expostulated Drusus, doing his best to retain his outward calm, ”I cannot understand of what fault I have become guilty.

Is it wrong in Rome to accept a kindly invitation from an old family friend to a dinner? Am I responsible for the persons the host summoned to meet me there?”

Drusus had been simply sparring to ward off the real point at issue; like many persons he would not a.s.sert his convictions and motives till fairly brought to bay. But that moment came almost instantly.

”Don't equivocate! _Mehercle!_” cried Lentulus, getting thoroughly angry. ”Can't you speak, except to lie and quibble before my face?

Have you joined the gang Curio is rallying for Caesar?”

Drusus was losing his own patience now.

”Yes! And we shall shortly see whether the Republic is to be longer ruined by incompetence and corruption!”

”Uncle! Quintus!” implored Cornelia, forcing herself between them, and casting out of her wide-open eyes on each a look full of distress.

”Don't contend! For my sake be friends!”

”For your sake!” raged Lentulus, his florid face growing redder and redder. ”I will take care to keep you out of the clutches of a man who deliberately chooses to a.s.sociate with all that is base and villanous.

Until your handsome lover throws over connections with Caesar and his fellow-conspirators, let him never ask for your hand!”

”Sir,” burst in Drusus, flus.h.i.+ng with pa.s.sion, ”do you dare to set at naught the will of your brother and its express commands? Dare you withhold from me what is legally my own?”

”Legally?” replied Lentulus, with sharp scorn. ”Don't use that word to a consul-elect, who has the whole Senate and Pompeius behind him. Laws are very dangerous tools for a young man to meddle with in a case like this. You will be wise not to resort to the courts.”

”You defy the law!” thundered Drusus, all the blood of his fighting ancestors tingling in his veins. ”Do you say that to a Livian; to the heir of eight consuls, two censors, a master of the horse, a dictator, and three triumphators? Shall not _he_ obtain justice?”

”And perhaps,” said Lentulus, sinking into an att.i.tude of irritating coldness, ”you will further press your claim on the ground that your mother was a Fabian, and the Fabii claim the sole right to sacrifice to Hercules on the Great Altar[82] in the Cattle-market by the Flaminian Circus, because they are descended from Hercules and Evander. I think the Cornelian gens can show quite as many death-masks in its atria, and your mock heroics will only stamp you as a very bad tragedian.”

[82] _Ara Maxima_.

”Uncle! Quintus!” implored Cornelia again, the tears beginning to start from her eyes. ”Cease this dreadful quarrel. Go away until you can talk calmly.”

”Quintus Livius,” shouted Lentulus, dropping the ”Drusus,” a part of the name which was omitted in formal address, ”you can choose here and now. Forswear your Caesarian connections, or consider my niece's betrothal at an end!”

Drusus stood looking in blank dismay from one to the other of the little company. Claudia had started to speak, but closed, her lips without uttering a word. Lentulus faced him, hot, flushed, and with a cynical smile of delight, at the infliction of mental torture, playing over his face. Cornelia had dropped down upon a chair, buried her pretty face in her hands, and was sobbing as if her heart would break.

It was a moment Drusus would not soon forget. The whole scene in the atrium was stamped upon his memory; the drops of the fountain seemed frozen in mid-air; the rioting satyr on the fresco appeared to be struggling against the limitations of paint and plaster to complete his bound; he saw Cornelia lift her head and begin to address him, but what she said was drowned by the buzzing and swirl which unsteadied the young man's entire faculties. Drusus felt himself turning hot and cold, and in semi-faintness he caught at a pillar, and leaned upon it.

He felt numbed mentally and physically. Then, by a mental reaction, his strong, well-balanced nature rea.s.serted itself. His head cleared, his muscles relaxed their feverish tension, he straightened himself and met the cool leer of Lentulus with a glance stern and high; such a glance as many a Livian before him had darted on foe in Senate or field of battle.

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