A CRIME PREVENTED.
The deadly malice of Fausta, Furca, and Naso towards the Empress
Valeria, foiled in its attempt to invoke upon her the penalties of the
edict against the Christians, sought, by secret means, to procure her
death. Juba, the black slave, was heavily bribed to prepare some of her
most subtle poisons and procure their administration. But here a
difficulty presented itself, and it is a striking illustration of the
corruption of the Empire and of the daily peril in which the inhabitants
of the Imperial palace dwelt--a state of peril which finds its modern
analogue only in the continual menace under which the Czar of all the
Russias lives, with a sword of Damocles suspended by a single hair above
his head. Such was the atmosphere of suspicion which pervaded the whole
palace, such the dread of assassination or of poisoning, that trusty
guards and officers swarmed in the ante-chambers and prevented access to
the members of the Imperial family except under the most rigid
precautions of safety; and a special officer was appointed, whose duty,
as his title of _Prægustalor_ implies, was to taste every kind of food
or drink provided for the Imperial table. Regard for his personal safety
was, of course, a guarantee that the utmost precautions were observed in
preparing the daily food of the Imperial household. Juba in vain
attempted to bribe some of the kitchen scullions and cooks to mix with
the savoury viands designed for the use of Valeria, who generally
lunched in her private apartments, a potent poison. They accepted,
indeed, her bribes, but prudently declined to carry out their part of
the agreement, well knowing that she dare not venture to criminate
herself by an open rupture with them.
At length she resolved on attempting a more subtle but less certain mode
of administering a deadly drug. While in the service of a priest of Isis
in Egypt, she had extorted or cajoled from an Abyssinian slave in his
service certain dark secrets, learned it was said by the Queen of Sheba
from Solomon, and handed down from age to age as the esoteric lore of
the realm. One of these was the preparation of a volatile poison so
subtle and powerful that its mere inhalation was of deadly potency. As a
means of conveying this to her victim, and at the same time of
disguising the pungent aromatic odour, a basket of flowers which she had
plentifully sprinkled with the deadly poison was sent to the Empress. To
make assurance doubly sure, she concealed among the flowers one of
those beautiful but deadly asps, such as that from the bite of which the
dusky Queen of Egypt, the wanton Cleopatra, died. This, for purposes
connected with her nefarious arts, she had procured as what evil thing
could not be procured?--from the dealers in deadly drugs, philtres, and
potions in the crowded Ghetto of Rome.
To ensure the conveyance of the deadly gift to the hands of Valeria
herself, Juba invented the fiction that they were a thankoffering from
the young Greek, Isidorus, to his Imperial patroness for favours
received. With her characteristic cunning Juba had possessed herself of
the secret of his services rendered to the Empress, and of the interest
felt in him by her august mistress.
Valeria was in her _boudoir_ with her favourite and now inseparable
Callirhoë, as her tire woman, dressing her hair, when the fatal missive
arrived. As Callirhoë received the basket from the hands of Juba, the
eyes of the slave gleamed with the deadly hate of a basilisk, and she
muttered as she turned away--
"May the curse of Isis rest on them both. My fine lady has driven black
Juba from the tiring room of the Empress. May she now share her fate,"
and, like a sable Atropos, she glided from the chamber with stealthy and
cat-like tread.
"Oh! what fresh and fragrant flowers," exclaimed the Empress Valeria, as
she bent over them, "see how the dew is yet fresh upon their petals."
Here she raised the basket so as more fully to inhale their fragrance.
At that moment the concealed and deadly asp whose dark green and glossy
skin had prevented its detection among the acanthus and lily leaves,
seized, with his envenomed fang, the damask cheek of the fair Valeria,
and for a moment clung firmly there.
"God, save her!" exclaimed Callirhoë, who in a moment recognized the
cruel aspic, of which, as a child, she had been often warned in her
native Antioch, and with an eager gesture she flung the venomous reptile
to the ground and crushed its head beneath her sandal's heel. On the
quick instinct of the moment and without stopping to think of the
consequences to herself, she threw her arms about her Imperial mistress'
neck, and pressing her lips to her cheek, sucked the venom from the yet
bleeding wound.
The cry of the Empress as the little serpent stung her cheek brought a
swarm of attendants and slaves into the room, among them black Juba and
the officer of the guard who was responsible for the Empress' safety.
Valeria had fainted and lay pale as ashes on her couch, a crimson stream
flowing from her cheek.
"Dear heart!" exclaimed Juba, with an ostentatious exhibition of
well-feigned grief, "let her inhale this fragrant elixir. It is a potent
restorative in such deadly faints," and she attempted to complete her
desperate crime by thrusting the poisonous perfume under Valeria's
nostrils.
"Who was last in the presence before this strange accident--if it be an
accident--occurred?" demanded the officer.
"I and Juba, were the only ones," faltered Callirhoë, when a deathly
pallor passed over her face, and with a convulsive shudder she fell
writhing on the ground.
"You are under arrest," said the officer to. Juba, and then to a soldier
of the guard, "Go, seize and seal up her effects--everything she has;
and you," turning to another, "send at once the court physician."
The attendants meanwhile were fanning and sprinkling with water the
seemingly inanimate forms of the Empress and Callirhoë. When the
physician came and felt the fluttering pulse and noted the dilated eyes
of his patients, he pronounced it a case of acrid poisoning and
promptly ordered antidotes. The Empress, in a few days rallied and
seemed little the worse beyond a strange pallor which overspread her
features and an abnormal coldness, almost as of death, which pervaded
her frame. From these she never fully recovered, but throughout her life
was known in popular speech as "The White Lady."
Upon Callirhoë the effects of the poison were still more serious. By her
prompt action in sucking the aspic virus from the envenomed wound, she
had saved the life of her beloved mistress, but at the peril of her own.
The venom coursed through her veins, kindling the fires of fever in her
blood. Her dilated eyes shone with unusual brilliance; her speech was
rapid; her manner urgent; and her emotions and expressions were
characterized by a strange and unwonted intenseness. The physician in
answer to the eager questioning of Valeria, gravely shook his head, and
said that the case was one that baffled his skill--that cure there was
none for the aspic's poison if absorbed into the system, although as it
had not in this case been communicated directly to the blood, possibly
the youth and vigour of the patient might overcome the toxic effect of
the contagium--so he learnedly discoursed.
"My dear child, you have given your life for mine," exclaimed the
Empress, throwing her arms around her late enfranchised slave, and
bedewing her cheek with her tears.
"God grant it be so," said Callirhoë, with kindling eye. "I would gladly
die to save you from a sorrow or a pain. I owe you more than life. I owe
you liberty and a life more precious than my own."
"All that love and skill can do, dear heart, shall be done," said the
Empress caressingly, "to preserve you to your new-found liberty, and to
your sire."
"As God wills, dearest lady," answered Callirhoë, kissing her mistress'
hand. "In His great love I live or die content. I bless Him every hour
that He has permitted me to show in some weak way, the love I bear my
best and dearest earthly friend."
And with such fond converse passed the hours of Valeria's convalescence,
and of Callirhoë's deepening decline.
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