A Friend of Cæsar: A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. William Stearns Davis
over in Tibur, and was such a prodigy; oh, yes, here it is at last; you may as well hear what all Rome knows now, it's at the end, among the private affairs. 'Lucius Ahenobarbus, son of Lucius Domitius, the Consular, and Cornelia, daughter of the late tribune, Caius Lentulus, are in love. They will be married soon.'"
These two brief sentences, which the mechanical difficulties under which journalistic enterprise laboured at that day made it impossible to expand into a modern "article," were quite sufficient to tell a whole story to Rome. Cornelia realized instantly that she had been made the victim of some vile trick, which she doubted not her would-be lover and her uncle had executed in collusion. She took the tablets from Herennia's hand, without a word, read the falsehoods once, twice, thrice. The meaning of the day attached to the terms used intimated the existence of a low intrigue, quite as much as any honourable "engagement." If Cornelia did not soon become the lawful wife of Lucius Ahenobarbus, the world would feel justified in piling scandal upon her name. The blow was numbing in its brutality. Instead of crying and execrating the liars, as Herennia fully expected her to do, Cornelia merely handed back the tablets, and said with cold dignity, "I think some very unfortunate mistake has been made. Lucius Ahenobarbus is no friend of mine. Will you be so kind as to leave me with my maids?"
Herennia was overborne by the calm, commanding attitude of the rival she had meant to annoy. When Cornelia became not the radiant debutante, but the haughty patrician lady, there was that about her which made her wish a mandate. Herennia, in some confusion, withdrew. When she was gone, Cornelia ordered her maids out of the room, stripped off the golden tiara they had been plaiting into her hair, tore away the rings, bracelets, necklaces, and flung herself upon the pillows of the divan, quivering with sobs. She did not know of a single friend who could help her. All the knowledge that she had imbibed taught her that there was no God either to hear prayer, or succour the wronged. Her name would become a laughing-stock and a hissing, to be put on a par with Clodia's or that of any other frivolous woman, unless she not merely gave up the man she loved, but also threw herself into the arms of the man she utterly hated. The craving for any respite was intense. She was young; but for the moment, at least, life had lost every glamour. If death was an endless sleep, why not welcome it as a blessed release? The idea of suicide had a grasp on the ancient world which it is hard at first to estimate. A healthy reaction might have stirred Cornelia out of her despair, but at that instant the impulse needed to make her commit an irrevocable deed must have been very slight. But while she lay on the pillows, wretched and heart-sick, the voice of Agias was heard without, bidding the maids admit him to their mistress.
"Stay outside. I can't see you now," moaned poor Cornelia, feeling that for once the sight of the good-humoured, vivacious slave-boy would be maddening. But Agias thrust back the curtains and boldly entered. What he said will be told in its due time and place; but the moment he had gone Cornelia was calling in Cassandra, and ordering the maids to dress her with all possible speed for the dinner-party.
"I must be all smiles, all enchantments," she was saying to herself. "I must dissemble. I must win confidences. I must do everything, and anything. I have no right to indulge in grief any longer. Quintus's dear life is at stake!"
II
Lentulus did not go to the banquet of Favonius, to see the unwonted graciousness with which his niece received the advances of Lucius Ahenobarbus, Neither was Favonius himself present at his own entertainment. They, and several others of the high magnates of their party, had been called away by an urgent summons, and spent the evening in secluded conference with no less a personage than Pompeius, or as he dearly loved to be called, "the Magnus," in his splendid palace outside the walls on the Campus Martius. And here the conqueror of Mithridates—a stout, soldierly man of six-and-fifty, whose best quality was a certain sense of financial honesty, and whose worst an extreme susceptibility to the grossest adulation—told them that he had received letters from Labienus, Cæsar's most trusted lieutenant in Gaul, declaring that the proconsul's troops would never fight for him, that Cæsar would never be able to stir hand or foot against the decrees of the Senate, and that he, Labienus, would desert him at the first opportunity.
Cheerful news this to the noble lords, who had for years scented in Cæsar's existence and prosperity destruction to their own oligarchic rule of almost the known world. But when Cato, the most violent anti-Cæsarian of them all, a sharp, wiry man with angular features, and keen black eyes, demanded:—
"And now, Magnus, you will not hesitate to annihilate the enemies of the Republic?" a look of pained indecision flitted across Pompeius's face.
"Perpol, gentlemen," he exclaimed, "I would that I were well out of this. Sometimes I think that you are leading me into breaking with Cæsar for some ends of your own. He was my friend before you had a word of praise for me. He loved Julia; so did I." And the Magnus paused a moment, overcome by the thought of his dead wife. "Perhaps the Republic demands his sacrifice, perhaps—" and he cast a glance half of menace upon Lentulus Crus and Cato, "you are the guilty, not he. But I am in grievous doubt."
"Perhaps, Magnus," said Favonius, with half a sneer, "you think your forces inadequate. The two legions at Luceria are just detached from Cæsar. Perhaps you question their fidelity."
"Man," retorted the general, fiercely, bringing his foot down upon the soft rug on the floor, "I have but to stamp upon the ground to call up legions out of Italy; it is not that which I fear!"
The members of the conference looked uneasy; there was still a bare chance that Pompeius would go back to his old friendship with Cæsar.
"Gentlemen," went on the Magnus, "I have called you here to reach a final decision—peace or war. Let us consult a higher power than human." And he touched a little silver bell that was upon the table close at hand.
Forthwith there was a rustle of curtains, and out of the gloom of the doorway—for the hour was now very late—advanced a tall, gaunt figure, dressed in a plain, sleeveless robe that fell to the feet. The skin was dry, hard, wrinkled by a hundred furrows; the bones of the face were thrust out prominently; on the head was a plain white turban, and a beard quite as white fell down upon the breast. Only from under the turban shone the eyes, which were bright and piercing as coals of fire.
The stranger advanced without a word, till he stood before Pompeius, then knelt and made an elaborate Oriental prostration. The noble Romans, twelve or more of the magnates of the greatest power on the earth, held their breath in uneasy anticipation. Not one of them perhaps really believed in a personal god; but though atheists, they could not forswear their superstition. Piso, the censor, who notoriously feared neither divine nor human law in his reckless life, spat thrice to ward off the effects of the evil eye, if the stranger were a magician.
"Ulamhala," said Pompeius, addressing the newcomer, "arise. Since I have been in the East,[89] I have consulted you and your science of the stars, in every intended step, and your warnings have never failed."
"My lord doth overcommend the wisdom of his slave," replied Ulamhala (for such was his name) in Syriac Greek, with a second deep obeisance.
"Now, therefore," went on Pompeius—and his voice was unsteady with evident excitement and anxiety—"I have called you hither to declare the warnings of the stars upon the most important step of my life. What lies now at stake, you know full well. Three days ago I bade you consult the heavens, that this night you might be able to declare their message, not merely to me, but to these my friends, who will shape their actions by mine. Have you a response from the planets?"
"I have, lord," and again Ulamhala salaamed.
"Then declare, be it good or ill;" commanded Pompeius, and he gripped the arms of his chair to conceal his anxiety.
The scene was in a way weird enough. The visitors exchanged uneasy glances, and Cato, who broke out in some silly remark to Favonius, in a bold attempt to interrupt the oppressive silence, suddenly found his words growing thick and broken, and he abruptly became silent. Each man present tried to tell himself that Pompeius was a victim of