Part 35 (1/2)

The Tullianum! Drusus knew no other term to conjure up a like abode of horrors--the ancient prison of the city, a mere chamber sunk in the ground, and beneath that a dungeon, accessible only by an opening in the floor above--where the luckless Jugurtha had perished of cold and starvation, and where Lentulus Sura, Cethegus, and the other lieutenants of Catilina had been garroted, in defiance of all their legal rights, by the arbitrary decree of a rancorous Senate! So at last the danger had come! Drusus felt himself quiver at every fibre.

He endured a sensation the like of which he had never felt before--one of utter moral faintness. But he steadied himself quickly. Shame at his own recurring cowardice overmastered him. ”I am an unworthy Livian, indeed,” he muttered, not perhaps realizing that it is far more heroic consciously to confront and receive the full terrors of a peril, and put them by, than to have them harmlessly roll off on some self-acting mental armour.

”Escape! There is yet time!” urged Agias, pulling his toga. Drusus shook his head.

”Not until the Senate has set aside the veto of the tribunes,” he replied quietly.

”But the danger will then be imminent!”

”A good soldier does not leave his post, my excellent Agias,” said the Roman, ”until duty orders him away. Our duty is in the Senate until we can by our presence and voice do no more. When that task is over, we go to Caesar as fast as horse may bear us; but not until then.”

”Then I have warned you all in vain!” cried Agias.

”Not at all. You may still be of the greatest service. Arrange so that we can leave Rome the instant we quit the Curia.”

”But if the lictors seize you before you get out of the building?”

”We can only take our chance. I think we shall be permitted to go out.

I had intended to ride out of the city this evening if nothing hindered and the final vote had been pa.s.sed. But now I see that cannot be done. You have wit and cunning, Agias. Scheme, provide. We must escape from Rome at the earliest moment consistent with our duty and honour.”

”I have it,” said Agias, his face lighting up. ”Come at once after leaving the Curia, to the rear of the Temple of Mars.[144] I know one or two of the temple servants, and they will give me the use of their rooms. There I will have ready some slave dresses for a disguise, and just across the aemilian bridge I will have some fast horses waiting--that is, if you can give me an order on your stables.”

[144] The aedes Martis of the Campus Martius.

Drusus took off his signet ring.

”Show that to Pausanias. He will honour every request you make, be it for a million sesterces.”

Agias bowed and was off. For the last time Drusus was tempted to call him back and say that the flight would begin at once. But the nimble Greek was already out of sight, and heroism became a necessity. Drusus resolutely turned his steps toward the senate-house. Not having been able to forecast the immediate moves of the enemy, he had not arranged for hurried flight; it was to be regretted, although he had known that on that day the end of the crisis would come. He soon met Antonius, and imparted to him what he had just learned from Agias, and the precautions taken.

Antonius shook his head, and remarked:--

”You ought not to go with me. Little enough can we who are tribunes do; you have neither voice nor vote, and Lentulus is your personal foe. So back, before it is too late. Let us s.h.i.+ft for ourselves.”

Drusus replied never a word, but simply took the tribune's arm and walked the faster toward the Curia.

”I am a very young soldier,” he said presently; ”do not be angry if I wish to show that I am not afraid of the whizzing arrows.”

”Then, my friend, whatever befalls, so long as life is in my body, remember you have a brother in Marcus Antonius.”

The two friends pressed one another's hands, and entered the Curia Pompeii. There in one of the foremost seats sat the Magnus,[145] the centre of a great flock of adulators, who were basking in the suns.h.i.+ne of his favour. Yet Drusus, as he glanced over at the Imperator, thought that the great man looked hara.s.sed and worried--forced to be partner in a scheme when he would cheerfully be absent. Fluttering in their broad togas about the senate-house were Domitius, Cato, the Marcelli, and Scipio, busy whipping into line the few remaining waverers. As Cato pa.s.sed the tribune's bench, and saw the handful of Caesarians gathered there, he cast a glance of indescribable malignity upon them, a glance that made Drusus shudder, and think again of the horrors of the Tullianum.

[145] Pompeius was not allowed by law to attend sessions of the Senate (so long as he was proconsul of Spain) when held inside the old city limits; but the Curia which he himself built was outside the walls in the Campus Martius. This meeting seems to have been convened there especially that he might attend it.

”I know now how Cato looked,” said he to Antonius, ”when he denounced the Catilinarians and urged that they should be put to death without trial.”

Antonius shrugged his shoulders, and replied:--

”Cato cannot forgive Caesar. When Caesar was consul, Cato interrupted his speech, and Caesar had him haled off to prison. Marcus Cato never forgives or forgets.”

Curio, Caelius, and Quintus Ca.s.sius had entered the senate-house--the only Caesarians present besides Antonius and his viator. The first two went and took their seats in the body of the building, and Drusus noticed how their colleagues shrank away from them, refusing to sit near the supporters of the Gallic proconsul.

”_Eho!_” remarked Antonius, his spirits rising as the crisis drew on.