Part 10 (2/2)
”And they crucified him?”
”Aye! like a common thief. 'Twas right and just since he rebelled against Caesar.”
”And yet, Licinia, there are those in Rome who do him service even now.”
”The G.o.ds forbid!” exclaimed Licinia in horror. ”And how could that be?”
she added with a shrug of the shoulders, ”seeing that he died such a shameful death.”
”I marvel on that also,” said the young girl, whose wide-open blue eyes once more a.s.sumed their strangely puzzled expression.
”Nay! I'll not believe it,” rejoined the old woman hotly. ”Do that man service? A common traitor who died upon the cross. Who did stuff thine ears, my G.o.ddess, with such foolish tales?”
”No one told me foolish tales, Licinia. But this I do know, that there are some in Rome who set that Galilean above the majesty of Caesar, and in his name do defy Caesar's might.”
”They are madmen then,” said the slave curtly.
”Or traitors,” added Dea Flavia.
”Thou sayest it; they are traitors and rebels, and never fear, they'll be punished ... sooner or later, they will be punished.... Defy the might of Caesar?... Great G.o.ds above! the impious wretches! thou wert right, my princess! Death alone were too merciful for them.... The scourge first ... and then the cross ... that will teach them the might of thy house, oh daughter of Caesar.... I would have no mercy with them.... Throw them to the beasts, say I!... brand them ... scourge them ... wring their heart's blood until they cry for death...!”
The old pagan looked evil and cruel in her fury of loyalty to that house which begat her beloved Dea. Her eyes glistened as those of a cat waiting to fall upon its prey; her wrinkled hands looked like claws that were ready to tear the very flesh and sinew from the traitor's breast.
Her voice, always hoa.r.s.e and trembling, had risen to a savage shriek which died away as in a pa.s.sionate outburst of love she threw herself down on the floor beside the couch, and taking Dea's tiny feet between her hands, she covered them with kisses and with tears.
But Dea Flavia once more lay back on the coverlet of crimson silk and her blue eyes once more were fixed upwards to the sky. Above her the glint of blue was now suffused with tones of pink merging into mauve; somewhere out west the sun was slowly sinking into rest. Tiny golden clouds flitted swiftly across that patch of sky on which Dea Flavia gazed so intently.
”Come kiss me, Licinia,” she said slowly after a while. ”I'll to rest now. To-morrow I shall see my kinsman the Caesar again, after a year's absence from him. I desire to be very beautiful to-morrow, Licinia, for mayhap I'll to the games with him. That new tunic worked with purple and gold. I'll wear that and my new shoes of antelope skin. In my hair the circlet of turquoise and pearls ... dost think it'll become me, Licinia?”
”Thou wilt be more beautiful, my precious one, than man's eyes can conveniently endure,” said Licinia, whose whole face became radiant with the joy of her perfect love for the girl.
”Ah! thou hast soothed my heart and mind, Licinia. I feel that I shall sleep well to-night.”
She allowed the old woman to lead her gently to her bedchamber, where within the narrow alcove she lay all that night tossing upon the silken mattress that was stuffed with eiderdown. Sleep would not come to her, and hour after hour she lay there, her eyes fixed into the darkness on which, at times, her fevered fancy traced a glowing cross.
CHAPTER VIII
”The lot is cast into the lap, but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord.”--PROVERBS XVI. 33.
And even thus did the mighty Empire hurry headlong to its fall; with shouts of joy and cries of exultation, with triumphal processions, with music, with games and with flowers.
The Caesar had returned from Germany and Gaul having played his part of mountebank upon the arena of the world. Eaten up with senseless and cynical vanity, Caius Julius Caesar Caligula desired to be the Caesar of his army as he was princeps and imperator, high pontiff and supreme dictator of the Empire. But as there was no war to conduct, no rebellion to subdue, he had invented a war and hara.s.sed some barbarians who had no thought save that of peace.
He stage-managed conspiracies and midnight attacks, drilling his own soldiers into acting the parts of malcontents, of escaped prisoners, of bloodthirsty barbarians, the while he himself--as chief actor in the play--vanquished the mock foes and took from them mock spoils of war.
Then he upbraided Rome for her inertia whilst he, the Emperor, confronted dangers and endured hards.h.i.+ps for her sake. His letters, full of glowing accounts of his supposed prowess, of the ferocity of the enemy, of the fruits of victory s.n.a.t.c.hed at the cost of innumerable sacrifices were solemnly read to the a.s.sembled senators in the temple of Mars, and to a vast concourse of people gathered in the Forum.
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