"Art hurt?" she said gently, "art hurt, child? I did not wish to hurt thee. Stop thy weeping--and I'll give thee that amber locket which thou dost covet so. Stop thy weeping, I say! Is it my white rabbit thou dost hanker after--thou shalt have it for thine own--or--or--the woollen tunic with the embroidered bands--or--or--Stop whining, girl," she added impatiently, seeing that the girl, more frightened than hurt, was sobbing louder than before. "Licinia, make her stop--she angers me with all this whining--stop, I tell thee. Oh, Licinia, where is thy whip? I vow I'll have the girl whipped if she do not stop."

But Licinia, accustomed to her mistress's quick changing moods, had in her turn knelt beside the girl and was busy now with deft hands in staunching the blood and tying up the wound. This done she dragged the child up roughly, though not unkindly, from the ground.

"Get thee gone and lie down on thy bed," she said; "shame on thee for making such a to-do. My lady had no wish to hurt thee, and thou hast upset her with all this senseless weeping. Get thee gone now ere I do give thee that whipping which thou dost well deserve."

She contrived to push the girl out of the chamber and ordered two others to follow and look after her; then once more she turned to her mistress, ready to tender fond apologies since what she had said had so angered her beloved.

Dea Flavia had thrown herself on the couch on her back; her arms were folded behind her head, her fair hair lay in heavy ma.s.ses on the embroidered coverlet. She was staring straight up at the ceiling, her blue eyes wide open, and a puzzled frown across her brow.

"My precious one," murmured Licinia.

But Dea Flavia apparently did not hear. It seemed as if she were grappling in her mind with some worrying puzzle, the solution of which lay hidden up there behind that brilliant bit of blue sky which glimmered through the square opening in the roof.

"My precious one," reiterated the old woman appealingly, "tell me, Dea--was it aught that I said which angered thee?"

Dea Flavia turned large wondering eyes to her old nurse.

"Licinia," she said slowly.

"Yes, my G.o.ddess."

"If a man saith that there is one greater, mightier than Caesar ... he is a traitor, is he not?"

"A black and villainous traitor, Augusta," said Licinia, whose voice at the mere suggestion had become hoa.r.s.e with awe.

"And what in Rome is the punishment for such traitors, Licinia?" asked the young girl, still speaking slowly and measuredly.

"Death, my child," replied the old woman.

"Only death?" insisted Dea, whilst the puzzled look in her eyes became more marked, and the frown between her brows more deep.

"I do not understand thee, my precious one," said Licinia whose turn it was now to be deeply puzzled; "what greater punishment could there be for a traitor than that of death?"

"They torture slaves for lesser offences than that."

"Aye! and for sedition there is always the cross."

"The cross!" she murmured.

"Yes! Dost remember seven years ago in Judaea? There was a man who raised sedition among the Jews, and called himself their king--setting himself above Caesar and above the might of Caesar.... They crucified him. Dost remember?"

"I have heard of him," she said curtly. "What was his name?"

"Nay! I have forgot. Methinks that he came from Galilee. They did crucify him because of sedition, and because he set himself to be above Caesar."

"And above the House of Caesar?"

"Aye! above the House of Caesar too."

"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 hardships 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.