A Christian But a Roman Part 11

The eunuch returned, followed by two slaves, who bore on a bier a corpse covered with a large pall.

aevius drew it from the body.

Mesembrius pressed his hand upon his heart; the blood rushed to his temples; his breath failed; he could not move; he stood motionless for a time, then, with a wild cry of anguish, flung himself upon the lifeless form.

"My child! My dear, dear child!"

"So I have him to fear, too," murmured Carinus.

Sobbing aloud, Mesembrius embraced the beautiful, beloved body. Death had restored to the face the repose, the supernatural loveliness which had been peculiar to it in life. It seemed as though she were sleeping and at a call would wake.

"Oh, my dear, sweet child," sobbed the old man; "why must you leave me here? If you were resolved to die, why did you not appear to me in a dream, that I might have followed you? What have I to love in this world now that you are no more? What is to become of me, an old withered tree, whose only blossoming branch has been cut off? Have you no longer one word, one smile for me? Once you were so gay, so full of cheerful converse--oh, why must I endure this?"

The father turned neither to the Caesar nor to the courtiers; he gave free course to his tears, burying his face in his dead daughter's winding-sheet.

But gradually he seemed to realise that he was weeping alone, and his dim eyes wandered around the apartment with a vague consciousness that there must be some one else here who owed to Sophronia's manes the tribute of tears.

There stood Manlius, with a cold, unsympathising face, talking to Carinus. Not a feature betrayed the slightest sorrow.

Mesembrius indignantly grasped the youth's arm.

"And have _your_ eyes no tears, when your bride lies murdered before you?"

Seized with suspicion Carinus suddenly looked at Manlius; the courtiers, with malicious pleasure, turned toward him.

"My bride?" asked Manlius, in a tone of astonishment. "Your mind is wandering, old Mesembrius."

"Have the Furies robbed you of your reason that you no longer remember that, but three days ago, you asked for my daughter's hand and I gave it to you?"

"Your daughter's hand, certainly," replied Manlius, with unshaken calmness. "Not this daughter's here, however, but Glyceria's."

"May you be accursed!" shouted Mesembrius, with savage fury, and without heeding the Caesar, his dead daughter, or the danger threatening him, he rushed out of the hall like a madman.

This very thing saved him.

"Follow him, Galga!" shouted Carinus. "Seize him. This man's head must be laid at my feet."

Meanwhile Mesembrius rushed through the palace. The throng of slaves shrank back in terror at the sight of his agitated face, and allowed him to reach the open air. His frantic words instantly gathered a crowd around him, and by the time Galga, at the head of a troop of mounted praetorians, went in pursuit of him, the mob had attained threatening proportions. But the Thracian giant dashed recklessly through the ma.s.ses of people. As he stretched his arm from the saddle to seize the old man's head and sever it from the trunk with a single stroke of his sword, the Roman, with strength wholly unexpected in a man of his age, dealt the brown-skinned colossus such a blow with his heavy crutch that he fell from his horse with a shattered skull.

Mesembrius swung himself into the saddle at a bound, and led the infuriated populace against the armed cohort, which was scattered in a moment, and before reinforcements arrived to quell the tumult, the old patrician had disappeared and was never found.

CHAPTER X.

Manlius remained with Carinus to amuse him; he taught the dancing girls the dazzling arts of the Indian bayaderes, and conquered aevius by producing on every occasion, and at every toast, distiches more apt and beautiful than the court poet could fabricate.

During a single evening Carinus gave the now universally envied favourite a hundred thousand sestertiae, and, when he learned from him that the Teutonic women, by means of a special kind of soap, dyed their hair amber-yellow, he promised Manlius to appoint him Governor of Gallia that he might send him some of this soap which turned the hair yellow--at that period a hue ridiculously fas.h.i.+onable in the aristocratic society of Rome.

The banquet lasted a long time. True, it was only afternoon out of doors, but any one who did not know that the feast had begun in the morning would have supposed it was already midnight.

Carinus poured the wine that remained in the drinking horn upon the floor, in token that he drank some one's health, and then handed it to Manlius.

"To the health of the beautiful Glyceria!"

"And to yours, Carinus," replied Manlius, giving his own in exchange.

"Manlius," said Carinus, the blood mounting to his face, "do you know that I have already had one husband of Glyceria slain?"

"You did well, Carinus; but for that I could not become the second."

"Do you know why I had him killed?"

"Because he concealed his wife from you. Fool! Have the G.o.ds created a sun that some one may take possession of it and allow others no share in its light? Those who s.n.a.t.c.h a beautiful woman from the world, and then demand that she shall be loved by no one else, are thieves and robbers!"

"It might seem strange to you, Manlius, if I should take you at your word. You must know that I love your wife madly."

"That is your affair, Carinus. I do not keep her locked up. The way to her is open to every one."

"It is easy for you to play the magnanimous. She herself secludes herself sufficiently. While hundreds of thousands of men tremble at a wave of my hand, all my power cannot win the love of this one woman."

"And how Glyceria _can_ love! Ah, Carinus, I know that when, in the evening, the door opens to me which you always find closed, you would joyfully permit me to occupy your throne and reign in your stead so long as you fill my place as bridegroom."

Carinus sprang up as if an electric spark had thrilled him.

"_Hecataea!_ I will take you at your word! Take my throne, command my slaves, my empire in my name, have my favourites killed, make the lowest in Rome the highest, empty my treasure-houses, and, for all this, merely give me the key of your bridal-chamber."

"The bargain is made; here is my hand. Give me the parchment and stylus. Listen to what I write to Glyceria, and send it to her dwelling: 'G.o.ddess of my love! I shall spend the hours between evening and morning with you. My heart longs for your words of consolation.

The cypress-branch has wounded my brow; your rose-wreath may subdue its flames. When the evening star, the lamp of lovers, begins to s.h.i.+ne, extinguish yours that, if tears should dim my eyes, you may not see them, but only feel my kisses. Until dawn I shall be with you, and in possession of my happiness. Your languis.h.i.+ng husband, Manlius Sinister.' Send this letter by a slave, and put on this ring, which you must show at the door. Then you will be admitted, and Glyceria's women will conduct you where she awaits you."

Carinus listened greedily to every word from Manlius, who coolly handed him the ring and the letter. Trembling in every limb, he could not speak, but motioned to a slave to deliver Manlius' letter to Glyceria.

The courtiers whispered together in astonishment.

"What a fortunate man you are," aevius whispered in the ear of the new favourite. "Why did not I have the good luck to possess Glyceria's love, that I might cast it from me with the same indifference?"

The slave soon returned with a letter from Glyceria to Manlius.

The latter handed it to the Caesar:

"It is yours; read it!"

Carinus, with trembling hands, unrolled the parchment; his eyes sparkled as he read:

"Manlius! Your lines quiver in my hand. A thousand emotions are raging in my heart; fear, longing, holy horrour, and wild love. I am under the ban of an irresistible spell. I wish you might not come, but if you do, I shall be unable to resist you. I feel within my breast the power and the desire to destroy the whole world, but at a breath from you all my strength fails; I am nothing more than a weak, loving woman, who loses her reason in her love. Oh, do not come! Glyceria."

"That means: 'Oh, come!'" said Manlius laughing, propping himself carelessly on one elbow upon his couch.