FLACCUS WORKS A COMPLEXITY
Near sunset the following day the alabarch appeared in the porch of the
proconsul's mansion,--an incident which would speedily have spread
wildly over the Brucheum had not the shrewd Lysimachus come in Roman
dress, unostentatiously and hidden by the dusk. The slave who
conducted the visitor to the master's presence was suspicious, but he
did not lapse from courtesy. If he had prejudices they had to await a
popular uproar for expression, and popular uproars at present against
the Jews were manifestly in disfavor with the proconsul.
Flaccus received the alabarch in the great gloom of his atrium. The
torches had not been lighted, the cancelli admitted only dusk. The
shadowy shape of the proconsul, relaxed in his curule, alone and
immovable, thus surrounded by meditative atmosphere, suddenly appealed
to the alabarch as out of harmony with the legate's blunt nature.
As the Jew drew near, he saw rolls and parcels of linen and parchment,
petitions and memorials, scattered about on the pavement, as if the
Roman had let them roll off his table or drop from his hand
unconsciously. His elbow rested on the ivory arm of his curule, his
cheek on his clenched hand. The undimmed gaze of the Jewish magistrate
detected lines in the hard face that he had never seen before.
But Flaccus stirred and drew himself up to attention.
"Come up, Lysimachus," he said. "There is a chair here, for thee."
The alabarch advanced and dropped into the seat that Flaccus had
indicated.
"This," he observed, nodding toward the dark torch at the proconsul's
side, "would lead me to believe thou art inventing rhymes."
"Or conspiracies. Plots and poetry demand the same exciting dusk.
Well, has the Herod sued?"
"Not he, but his lady."
"His lady! By Hecate, the mystery is solved. Thus it is that he hath
been able to borrow every usurer poor from Rome to Damascus!"
"He wins upon her virtue; but withhold thy interpretation of my words
until I show thee what they mean. She is beautiful and virtuous; a
Herod and married--a conjunction of circumstances in these days so rare
as to be out of nature--therefore, phenomenal. So we toss our yellow
gold into her lap in recognition of the entertainment she hath
afforded--being unusual."
"Virtuous; that means, faithful to the man she married. No woman is
faithful except she loves her love. A just procession in the order of
the Furies' reign. The warm of heart, unrewarded; the unworthy,
anointed and worshiped."
"This melancholy twilight hath made thee morbid, Avillus. You Romans
take womankind too seriously."
"When womankind or a kind of woman can drain the world's purse,
methinks she is a serious matter. What sum does she want?"
"Three hundred thousand drachmae."
"O Midas; give her the touch! Let all her possessions be gold! Didst
advance it to her?"
"If thou wilt remember, it was thy command that I consult thee, first."
"Temperate Jew! To remember a consular suggestion, while a lovely
woman, and a Herod at that, besought thee for the contents of thy
purse. Oh, thou art an old, old man, Lysimachus!"
The alabarch laughed and frowned the next moment.
"Beshrew the jest! Men who make light of virtue deserve incontinent
wives. And there is this one thing apparent, which should make me
serious. The Herod is absolutely penniless, and I can not turn that
tender woman and her babes out of doors to take the roads of Egypt."
"Rest thee in that small matter. Thou and I can spare her sesterces
enough to ship her back to Judea."
Lysimachus was silent for a moment.
"She would not be satisfied," he said at last. "She wants three
talents, though she never had afterward a crust of bread. It seems
that they permitted a free-born man to pawn himself for that sum in
Ptolemais and accepted the money from him!"
"Shade of Herod!" the proconsul exclaimed.
"It seems also that the man is in peril of the authorities, having
placed himself in jeopardy to save Agrippa from Herrenius Capito, who
had run Agrippa to earth for a debt he owes to Caesar--"
"O, that is the way of it! I know of that man! Well, then, perchance
it is not so much because she loves her husband as because the debt to
the pawned one chafes. I hear that he is young and comely."
"Forget the slanderous jest, Flaccus; I am ashamed of it. What shall I
do in this matter?"
"Lend her three talents."
"She would buy the man's freedom, but what then? She would still be
here in Alexandria as penniless as ever."
"The consular suggestion, it seems, only held thee a moment in
abeyance," the proconsul said slyly. "She will get the three hundred
thousand drachmae, yet!"
"She will not," the alabarch declared, "First, because I have it not;
next, because I am not eager to pay a Herod's debts."
"Or, chiefly, because thou shouldst never see it again."
The alabarch tapped the pavement with his foot and looked away. The
attitude was confession to a belief in the proconsul's convictions.
"What sum couldst thou lend by pinching thyself?" Flaccus asked
presently.
"Two hundred thousand drachmae--but not to a Herod. I could lose five
talents without ruin."
"Give her five talents, then; give it--do not slander a gift by calling
it a loan."
"What! Toss an alms to a Herod? They would throw it in my face!"
"Jupiter! but they are haughty!"
The alabarch made no answer and Flaccus looked out at the night
dropping over his garden.
"Why not hold the lady in hostage, here, for five talents?" he asked
after a while.
The alabarch looked startled; it was Roman extremes, a trifle too
brutal for him to dress in diplomacy. He demurred.
"Not brutal, Lysimachus," Flaccus said earnestly. "Herod can not use
her well; it will be a respite from her long wandering and poverty.
Thou canst say to her that the five talents are all thou canst afford.
Tell her that it will do no more than beach them penniless in Italy;
that thou hast a crust for Agrippa--will she starve him by eating half
of it, herself?"
Flaccus laughed at his own words, but perplexity came into the
alabarch's face.
"But why?" he asked.
"Why? Is it not plain to you? Keep her so that Agrippa will in honor
have to redeem her if ever he become possessed of five talents!"
Now the alabarch laughed. "I am not so sure. Is it native in a Herod
to love his wife so well? It would be a bad mortgage for me to
foreclose--one cast-off female whose chief uses are for tears!"
"No, by Venus! She is too comely to play Dido. But try my plan,
Alexander. It is well worth the experiment."
The alabarch arose and stepped down from the rostrum. "It--it is--" he
hesitated. "But then, I should have them on my hands, under any
circumstances."
He took a few more steps, and paused for thought.
"Well enough," he said finally, "we shall see."
With a motion of farewell to the proconsul, he passed out and
disappeared.
Flaccus dropped back into his curule, and lapsed again into gloomy
meditation. The night fell and obscured him. He seemed to be waiting,
but not with marked impatience.
Again the atriensis bowed before him.
"A lady who says she was summoned," he said.
"Let her enter. And bid the lampadary light the torch, yonder, not
here--and only one."
The atriensis disappeared, and presently a slave with a burning reed
set fire to the wick in one of the brass bowls by the arch into the
vestibule, and Junia appeared.
"Hither, and sit beside me, Junia," Flaccus called to her.
He drew the chair closer, which the alabarch had occupied, and Junia,
dropping off her mantle and vitta, sat down in it.
"What a despot one's living is!" she exclaimed. "But for the fact I
owe my meat and wine to thy favor, thou shouldst have come to me,
to-night, not I to thee!"
"I came often enough at thy beck, Junia! It were time I was visited!"
"Thou ill-timed tyrant! I am expected at a feast to-night, and my
young gallant doubtless waits and wonders, at my house."
"Let him wait! I was his predecessor, and his better. Methinks thou
hast reduced thy standard of lovers of late."
"No longer the man but the substance," she answered. "In the old days
it was muscle and front; now it is purse and position."
"The first was love; the second calculation. Why wilt thou marry this
obscure young Alexandrian--whoever he be?"
"To be assured of a living--to cast off the hand thou hast had upon me,
thus long."
He leaned nearer that he might look into her face.
"So!" he exclaimed. "Does it chafe, in truth?"
She laughed. "No," she said. "Why should I prefer the provision of
one man above another's? Young Obscurity's authority over me, his
wife, would be no less tyrannical than Flaccus'--my one-time dear."
Flaccus took her hand and run his palm over her small knuckles.
"_Eheu!_" he said. "I shall not be happy to see thee wedded--"
"Nor shall I; like the fabulous maiden who weeps on the eve of her
marriage, I shall in good earnest heave a sigh over the days of my
freedom. Alas! the mind grows old young, that learns the fullness of
life early. There are as many ashes on my heart as there are in this
bulging temple of thine, Avillus."
"Dost thou love this--boy? Beshrew him, let him have no name!"
"How? Dost thou love the usurer that lends thee money, Flaccus?"
"What dost thou love, at all?" he asked.
"Sundry old memories; perchance the image of a consul, less portly,
less purple, less stiff--and less imposing!"
"Pluto! am I like that?" he demanded.
"To one that was thy dear in younger days. To one who does not
remember the sprightlier man, thou couldst be less charming."
"Younger? Now, how much younger? Six years at most! Thou hast not
changed in that time; why should I?"
"O Avillus; between the stage of the sun at noon and the previous hour,
there is no appreciable change. But mark the difference an hour makes
at sunset. But why this inquisition? Has Eros pierced thee in a new
spot?"
"Pierced me twenty years ago and his arrow sticketh yet in the wound it
made!"
"What! Spitted on an arrow during all those days thou didst love me?"
"But Eros has arrows and arrows, of many kinds, and two diverse barbs
may with all consistency find lodgment at once in a heart. But of
myself we may speak later; at present, I am moved to labor with thee
for thine own welfare. Why wilt thou marry this boy, for his purse,
when there are men in pain for thy favor?"
She studied him a moment. "I can not take thee back, Flaccus; love's
ashes can not be refired though the breath of Eros himself blew upon
them."
"Impetuous conclusion; hast thou forgotten the twenty-year-old wound
which I confessed just now? I am this moment only an arbiter for my
better--my betters--"
"I shall keep the twenty-year-old barb in mind," she said. "Methinks
it is that which pricks thee into activity for me."
"A wiser surmise than the first. But curb thy frivolous spirit; I am
weighted with the business of the great. What dost thou here, O
divinity, away from Rome and the arms of Caesar?"
"Dost thou forget that we were invited away, because of my father's
unfortunate preference of Sejanus, during the days of Sejanus'
greatness?"
"O Venus, can not the ban be lifted? Behold,"--stretching out his
muscular arm, "Flaccus is a strong man."
"Even then, is Tiberius thy better in comeliness? Perchance he would
not please me."
"I speak, now, to thy sordid self; but if thy maiden love of grace
still lives in thee, there shall another serve thee. Have I not said I
indorse two?"
"Two!"
"Two. Of Caesar first. His part in the bargain is really the smaller
thing. Thou, who couldst dint Flaccus' heart in Flaccus' stonier days,
who upset Caligula's domestic peace, put gray hairs in Macro's
forelock--all these in their doughty prime, methinks my poor doting
ancient in Capri will fall like a city with a thousand breaches in its
wall."
"Oh, doubtless," she admitted; "but what of myself? If thine impurpled
countenance--for all it is as firm as cocoanut flesh--if thine
impurpled countenance does not suit my Epicurean tastes, how shall I
content myself with the toothless love-making of a mumbling Boeotian?"
"Thou canst comfort thyself with a comely bankrupt on the gold of the
toothless one."
"It is complicated; too much duplication and detail," she objected.
"Thou hast done it before," he declared. "Thou art right expert."
She laughed and leaned back in her chair.
"Name me the comely one," she commanded.
"Agrippa." There was silence, in which she lifted her lowered eyes
very slowly and faced him. Amusement made small lines about her eyes,
and in her face was worldly wisdom mingled with a sort of friendliness.
"And now," she said in a quiet tone, "for the twenty-year-old wound.
Is it the Lady Herod?"
His gaze dropped; emotion put out the half-humor which had enlivened
his face. Presently he scowled.
"I have twitched the barb," she opined; "the wound is sore."
"Sore!" he brought out between clenched teeth. "Sore! I tell thee,
that though it is twenty years since I stood and saw her bound to him
by the flamens, I have not ceased day or night to suffer!"
Junia looked at him with frank amazement on her face; the proconsul was
declaring, with passion, a thing which she could not believe possible.
Such love as she knew, by the carefulest tendance, would have burnt out
and resolved into cold ashes in half that time. That it should endure
years, suffer discouragement, bridge distances and surmount obstacles,
all uncherished and unrequited, was fiction, pure and simple. Yet to
reconcile this conviction with the honest suffering of the bluff man at
her side was a task she could not attempt.
"Flaccus, I never pained thee so," she murmured. "Perchance the Jewess
dropped madness from a philter in thy wine. And for simple cruelty,
too, for she is fond of her graceful Arab."
The proconsul raised his head and looked at her with such speechless
ferocity, that she shrank away from him, remembering former
experiences. But he dropped his head into his hands and did nothing.
She watched him for a moment then ventured discreetly:
"Is it thy wish to win him from her, or her from him?"
"Both!" he answered. "The one accomplished, the other follows!" With
a sudden accession of emotion, he laid his short, powerful fingers
about her smooth wrist and bent over her.
"Help me, Junia!" he besought. "Weigh what I offer against the portion
of any Alexandrian. By the lips of Lysimachus, the richest man in the
city, I know how little even he may waste--two hundred thousand
drachmae--the cost of a single necklace Caesar might put about thy
throat. I never failed Tiberius; his esteem of me is great. I have
only to ask and the decree of banishment, or the sentence against thy
father, shall be lifted. Thou shalt return in honor to Rome; thy
father shall be one of Caesar's ministers, and thou shalt take thy place
among the first of the patricians. And Tiberius lays no bond of
fidelity upon his ladies. I saw thee, last night! I saw thee run
thine eyes along the Herod's sleek length--curse him, it was that which
undid me! I saw thy fancy incline toward him. It will be a new and
pleasant game for thee, Junia--a game in which thou art skilled--but it
is my life--my very life to me!"
She frowned at the jewels on her fingers. There was no reason why she
should not lend herself to Flaccus' schemes when her enlistment in his
cause assured to her the realization of the highest ambitions of her
kind. But enough of the creature impulse toward perversity, admitting
that his gain would be as great as hers, restrained her. She was
uncomfortable, uncertain, peevish. Meanwhile, the proconsul's
gray-brown eyes, large, intense, demanded of her.
"Wait!" she fretted at last. "Thou art hasty! And perchance thou dost
only make place for this mysterious fugitive for whom she was so
solicitous last night!"
He remembered his own jest with the alabarch, and added thereto the
impatient surmise of this penetrative woman. Could such a thing be
possible? He sprang to his feet, all the intensity of his emotion
concentrated in a spasm of fury and menace.
"Let him come!" he said between his teeth. "Let him come!"
She worked her hand loose from him.
"Wait," she repeated. "Thou hast built gigantically on no foundation.
Let something happen. And if I am pleased to follow thy plans, I may;
but be assured if I am not, I will not. My debt to thee is less than
thy demands, Avillus."
She arose and put on her mantle, while he stood watching her every
movement.
"I shall wait," he said presently, "only a little time."
She made a motion of impatience and withdrew from the atrium.
He stood motionless for a long time; then he called his atriensis.
"Send hither the chief apparitor," he said.
The captain of the proconsul's personal guard appeared and saluted.
Flaccus, in the meantime, had searched through the documents on the
floor and by the dim light identified one.
"Take this," he said, handing the apparitor the parchment, "and make
search for the man herein described. Seek him in Ptolemais, wherever a
Nazarene warren hides, in Jerusalem, in Alexandria--meet every incoming
ship, spend the half of my fortune, wear out my army--but find him, or
lose thy life!"
The chief apparitor looked unflinching into the proconsul's gray-brown
eyes.
"I hear," he said.
The proconsul waved his hand and the soldier withdrew.