"Unto Caesar". Emma Orczy
made the Empire; they had long ago sold their birthright of valour and of honour for the pottage of luxury and the favours of a tyrannical madman. What cared they if after they had feasted and shouted themselves hoarse in praise of a deified brute, the ruins of Rome came crashing down over their graves? What cared they if in far-off barbaric lands the Goths and Huns were already whetting their steel.
Only a few among the more dignified senators, a few among the more sober praetorian tribunes, revolted in their heart at this insane exhibition of egoism, these perpetual outrages on common sense and dignity; but they were few and their influence small, and they were really too indolent, too comfortable in their luxurious homes to do aught but accept what they deemed inevitable.
The only men in Rome who cared were the ambitious and the self-seekers, and they cared not because of Rome, not because of the glory of the Empire, or the welfare of the land, but because they saw in the very excess of the tyrant's misrule the best chance for their own supremacy and power.
Foremost amongst these was Caius Nepos, the praetorian praefect, all-powerful in the absence of the Cæsar, well liked by the army, so 'twas said. Some influential friends clung around him and also some malcontents, those who are ever on the spot when destruction is to be accomplished, ever ready to overthrow any government which does not happen to further their ambitions.
Most of these men were assembled this night beneath the gilded roof of Caius Nepos' house. He had gathered all his friends round him, had feasted them with good viands and costly wines, with roasted peacocks from Gaul and mullets come straight from the sea; he had amused them with oriental dancers and Egyptian acrobats, and when they had eaten and drunk their fill he bade them good night and sent them home, laden with gifts. But his intimates remained behind; pretending to leave with the others, they lingered on in the atrium, chatting of indifferent topics amongst themselves, until all had gone whose presence would not be wanted in the conclave that was to take place.
There were now some forty of them in number, rich patricians all of them, their ages ranging from that of young Escanes who was just twenty years old to that of Marcus Ancyrus, the elder, who had turned sixty. Their combined wealth mayhap would have purchased every inhabited house in the entire civilised world or every slave who was ever put up in the market. Marcus Ancyrus, they say, could have pulled down every temple in the Forum and rebuilt it at his own cost, and Philippus Decius who was there had recently spent the sum of fifty million sesterces upon the building and equipment of his new villa at Herculaneum.
Young Hortensius Martius was there, too, he who was said to own more slaves than anyone else in Rome, and Augustus Philario of the household of Cæsar, who had once declared that he would give one hundred thousand aurei for a secret poison that would defy detection.
"Why is not Taurus Antinor here this evening?" asked Marcus Ancyrus when this little group of privileged guests once more turned back toward the triclinium.
"I think that he will be here anon," replied the host. "I have sent him word that I desired speech with him on business of the State and that I craved the honour of his company."
They all assembled at the head of the now deserted tables. The few slaves who had remained at the bidding of their master had re-draped the couches and re-set the crystal goblets of wine and the gold dishes with fresh fruit. The long narrow hall looked strangely mournful now that the noisy guests had departed, and the sweet-scented oil in the lamps had begun to burn low.
The table, laden with empty jars, with broken goblets, and remnants of fruits and cakes, looked uninviting and even weird in its aspect of departed cheer. The couches beneath their tumbled draperies of richly dyed silk looked bedraggled and forlorn, whilst the stains of wine upon the fine white cloths looked like widening streams of blood. Under the shadows of elaborate carvings in the marble of the walls ghost-like shadows flickered and danced as the smoke from the oil lamp wound its spiral curves upwards to the gilded ceiling above. And in the great vases of priceless murra roses and lilies and white tuberoses, the spoils of costly glasshouses, were slowly drooping in the heavy atmosphere. The whole room, despite its rich hangings and gilded pillars, wore a curious air of desolation and of gloom; mayhap Caius Nepos himself was conscious of this, for as he followed his guests from out the atrium he gave three loud claps with his hands, and a troupe of young girls came in carrying bunches of fresh flowers and some newly filled lamps.
These they placed at the head of the table, there, where the couches surrounding it were draped with crimson silk, and soft downy cushions, well shaken up, once more called to rest and good cheer.
"I pray you all take your places," said the host pleasantly, "and let us resume our supper."
He gave a sign to a swarthy-looking slave, who, clad all in white, was presiding at a gorgeous buffet carved of solid citrus-wood which—despite the fact that supper had just been served to two hundred guests—was once more groaning under the weight of mammoth dishes filled with the most complicated products of culinary art.
The slave, at his master's sign, touched a silver gong, and half a dozen henchmen in linen tunics brought in the steaming dishes fresh from the kitchens. The carver set to and attacked with long sharp knife the gigantic capons which one of the bearers had placed before him. He carved with quickness and dexterity, placing well-chosen morsels on the plates of massive gold which young waiting-maids then carried to the guests.
"Wilt dismiss thy slaves before we talk?" asked Marcus Ancyrus, the veteran in this small crowd. He himself had been silent for the past ten minutes, doing full justice to this second relay of Caius Nepos' hospitality.
The waiting-maids were going the round now with gilt basins and cloths of fine white linen for the cleansing and drying of fingers between the courses; others, in the meanwhile, filled the crystal goblets with red or white wine as the guests desired.
"We can talk now," said the host; "these slaves will not heed us. They," he added, nodding in the direction of the carver and his half-dozen henchmen, "are all deaf as well as mute, so we need have no fear of them."
"What treasures," ejaculated young Escanes with wondering eyes fixed upon his lucky host; "where didst get them, Caius Nepos? By the gods, I would I could get an army of deaf-mute slaves."
"They are not easy to get," rejoined the other, "but I was mightily lucky in my find. I was at Cirta in Numidia at a time when the dusky chief there—one named Hazim Rhan—had made a haul of six malcontents who I understood had conspired against his authority. It seems that these rebels had a leader who had succeeded in escaping to his desert fastness, and whom Hazim Rhan greatly desired to capture. To gain this object he commanded the six prisoners to betray their leader; this they refused to do, whereupon the dusky prince ordered their ears to be cut off and threatened them that unless they spoke on the morrow, their tongues would be cut off the next day. And if after that they still remained obdurate, their heads would go the way of their tongues and ears."
Exclamations of horror greeted this gruesome tale, the relevancy of which no one had as yet perceived. But Caius Nepos, having pledged his friends in a draught of Sicilian wine, resumed:
"I, as an idle traveller from Rome had been received by the dusky chieftain with marked deference, and I was greatly interested in the fate of the six men who proved so loyal to their leader. So I waited three days, and when their tongues and ears had been cut off and their heads were finally threatened, I offered to buy them for a sum sufficiently large to tempt the cupidity of Hazim Rhan. And thus I had in my possession six men whose sense of loyalty had been splendidly proved and whose discretion henceforth would necessarily be absolute."
This time a chorus of praise greeted the conclusion of the tale. The cynical calm with which it had been told and the ferocious selfishness which it revealed seemed in no way repellent to Caius Nepos' guests. A few pairs of indifferent eyes were levelled at the slaves and that was all. And then Philippus Decius remarked coolly:
"So much for thy carvers and henchmen, O Caius Nepos, but thy waiting-maids?—are they deaf and dumb too?"
"No," replied the host, "but they come from foreign lands and do not understand our tongue."
"Then you all think that the next few days will be propitious for our schemes?" here broke in young Escanes who seemed the most eager amongst them all.