The Suburan had the letter written and completed to his mind, and the next
step was, of course, to have it delivered. For safety’s sake this was an
arrangement to be carried out with due circumspection; and, as he already
had an idea in his mind, he determined to put the missive away safely for
a time, to see if the opportunity he hoped for would present itself. He
came out of the wine‐shop, took a turn on the Marina, the favourite lounge
of the townsfolk, and then turned homeward. The direct thoroughfare suited
him no longer. Avoiding the street he made his way to the rear of the
potter’s premises. He resolved there should be no awkward meeting of
unwelcome faces if he could help it. As he drew near, passing through the
irregular patches of garden and pasture, he heard the sound of horses’
feet. He looked toward the main road, already described as running nigh to
Masthlion’s house, and saw a horseman garbed in military dress galloping
at a swift pace northward. He was already at some distance, and a few
yards further on his course the road dipped out of sight. At this point
the rider suddenly reined up, waved something white, and then was gone.
Cestus, with something like an oath of disappointment between his lips,
hastened on a few steps, till the little workshop of Masthlion, with its
smoking chimney, came into view. Then the struggling anathema rolled forth
in full and hearty distinctness, for there, on the little low wall
surrounding the garden‐patch of the potter, was Neæra, standing
motionless, with her white answering signal in her down‐dropped hand, and
her eyes yet fixed on the distant road. He had arrived just in time to
witness the disappearance of Martialis, the Centurion. He whom he had
expected and watched for with such restless anxiety, and to whom he had
mentally arranged to consign his letter for the safest delivery to its
destination. His extreme disgust and disappointment found its customary
relief in a furious spasm of frightful language, all the fiercer in that
he was obliged to suppress it, because of neighbours sprinkled here and
there nigh at hand in their little plots of garden ground. When he looked
again for Neæra she had disappeared. He followed into the house with a
visage dark and sullen as a thundercloud. The first to meet him was Neæra
herself; a strange contrast, inasmuch as joy sparkled in her eyes and
bloomed on her cheeks. It was testimony enough to the glance of Cestus.
‘Hath not the Centurion been here but now?’ he asked, gloomily enough.
‘Yes!’ replied Neæra, with yet more colour in her cheeks. ‘What is the
matter?’
‘Matter enough,’ was the sulky answer; ‘I have been dying to see him and
to have speech with him. I was even on the road this morning, thinking
that he might pass by chance, and if I had not gone into the town I should
have caught him. He must have followed me almost on my heels. Curse my
luck, why did I not come straight home?’
‘You were unlucky indeed, uncle; but he will not be away more than a few
days.’
‘Even that may prove too long,’ growled Cestus. ‘Said he anything about
affairs in the island that you can remember, Neæra? That the Prefect was
intending to return to the city before long?’
‘No, nothing. But had it been so, Lucius would scarce have been returning
to Capreae again.’
‘Humph!’ grunted Cestus, as Neæra glided away about her business, well
satisfied with the existing arrangements of the Centurion’s commander.
Cestus sought the little upstairs chamber, where he slept, and, having
hidden the letter to Fabricius in a safe place till required, he cast
himself on his pallet, wearied in body and intensely irritated in mind.
Here he fell asleep and found the day far gone when he awoke. His precious
missive occupied his first thoughts, and he went down into the town to try
and discover some chance of sending the same—a public post system being
unknown. In this he was lucky. A trading vessel had touched on her voyage
to the Tiber, and he found the master thereof perfectly willing to do as
he required. Cestus went and brought the letter and delivered it into the
seaman’s hands, with full instructions and a liberal subsidy. A visit to a
wine‐shop, where the liquor flowed plentifully, completed the transaction,
and then Cestus took leave of his new friend with many parting
injunctions. A couple of days passed, during which Cestus never left the
immediate vicinity of the house for any great length of time. He felt
constrained to the exercise of vigilance, but the restraint upon his
accustomed habits of liberty and self‐indulgence soon began to prove very
irksome. Nor did anything happen during that time to hinge the least
interest upon.
‘If I had chanced to leave the place for two or three hours, something
would have been sure to have turned up,’ he grumbled.
But what little had occurred had permanently unsettled the equilibrium of
his mind. He was beset with a certain kind of vague uneasiness, dull,
intangible, but sleepless; of the disagreeable nature of an ill
presentiment, which set the profoundest intellectual subtlety at defiance.
His restlessness increased, and the current of his thoughts set, with
increasing constancy and eagerness, toward his native Rome, till the
longing resembled that of a sick man or exile. The feeling rose so
strongly, that the early removal of himself to the great city took its
place as the first and most absorbing care of his mind. The family of the
potter, of course, he, of necessity, included with himself.
On the third day after the departure of Martialis, he was sitting alone
over the fire in the house, with his elbow on his knee and his hairy chin
on his hand, deeply occupied in arranging his method of procedure, or
rather in deciding on the manner of approaching Masthlion on the subject,
since the potter’s assent was the only real difficulty to be met. His
meditations were interrupted by the touch of a hand on his shoulder. He
looked up and saw Neæra standing beside him. He made as if to rise, with
the deference he had acquired in her presence, but, without removing her
hand from his bulky shoulder, she pressed him gently down in his place.
‘You were very deep in your thoughts, uncle; you never heard me come.’
‘That’s true enough,’ he replied, with a smile; ‘but your footstep lacks
weight to rouse a sleeper or day‐dreamer.’
‘You were not asleep, unless you sleep with your eyes open,’ said Neæra.
‘You were deep enough in a day‐dream, therefore. I can guess—was it not of
Rome?’
‘Well, that among other things, I am bound to say,’ replied Cestus.
‘I have come to ask you about my father. Have you ever thought of him
since we last spoke?’
‘I—I have not had a convenient opportunity,’ said Cestus, with hesitation.
‘What, not in all this time? Ah, that is a poor excuse!’
‘To speak truth, I was thinking of him when you came in,’ said Cestus,
guiltily dropping his eyes to the fire; ‘I was making up my mind to talk
to him before night.’
‘It is dusk already,’ said Neæra, shaking her head gently as if scarce
believing him.
‘That is so,’ replied Cestus, sweeping his glance round the little room,
where the shadows were gathering thick, and the flickering flames of the
fire in the brazier were beginning to define themselves on the walls; ‘but
there yet remains plenty of time. I am going to open a weighty subject
with him, so I am taking time to consider.’
‘And what may that be?’ asked Neæra, seating herself on a stool beside him
and looking into his face.
Cestus kept his glance on the fire as he replied:
‘It is not indeed so grave a matter after all, but he is sure to make it
so. I want him to cut loose from this tomb of a town and take up his abode
in Rome. It is the only place for a man of skill. Here he is buried.’
‘Here we have been very happy and content, until lately,’ responded the
fair girl, with a sigh. ‘I don’t think you will succeed.’
‘Yes, if you would help me,’ observed Cestus.
‘My father is the best judge, and I will abide by what he says.’
‘He must go eventually,’ said the Suburan, emphasising the word _must_,
‘so that you might as well persuade him to move with me at once.’
‘Must go! And what is there then to compel him?’ said Neæra quickly, in
surprise.
The Suburan’s eyes twinkled as he shot a sidelong glance at her beautiful
face.
‘Nothing but yourself,’ he said quietly; ‘that is why I asked you to
persuade him now rather than leave it later.’
Neæra wrinkled her pretty brows and perused her companion’s dark‐hued
shaggy face with an anxious, inquiring look. Then she shook her head.
‘I cannot understand,’ she said; ‘to say that of me seems to be nonsense.’
‘Don’t you see?’ exclaimed Cestus, reaching out his arm, and laying his
thick forefinger on her hand, as it rested on her knee, ‘don’t you see?
When you become the wife of Martialis he will take you to Rome, and by and
by your—Masthlion will be unable to live without the sight of you, so he
will assuredly follow. It is as plain and sure as the sun in heaven.’
The faintest shadow of a smile rested on her lips, and she dropped her
gaze from his face to the burning logs. The delicate lids drooped over the
lustre of her eyes, and a warmer tint suffused her skin.
‘It will be time when I go to Rome,’ she murmured; ‘wait till that comes
to pass.’
‘Therefore you will not help to persuade him to go now, as I recommend?’
‘I will not say a word.’
‘Think of the blessed change—the sights and shows, such as you never dream
of. When you are there you will say, “How did I live in such a dog’s hole
as that?”—meaning Surrentum.’
‘I think I have passed too many pleasant days here to think that ever,’
replied Neæra; ‘but my own inclinations have nothing to do with it, nor
shall they.’
‘Then again,’ continued Cestus, more artfully, ‘the Prefect has been a
long time in Capreae, and cannot be expected to remain there much longer.
He will return to Rome, and with him Martialis.’
This was a subtle stroke, but he got no reply, save only a low rippling
laugh and a shake of her head, which was turned persistently towards the
fire. Whereupon he shrugged his shoulders, and silence fell between them
for a considerable space, which he employed in fixedly watching her as she
sat with her hands clasped across her knee, apparently lost in a reverie.
The bright glow of the fire bathed her face and figure, and threw them
into striking relief in the now dark room. The Suburan, with his elbow on
his knee and his head dropped sideways on his hand, feasted his eyes with
the lovely picture she made, which drew no small portion of its charm from
the grace of her unconsciousness. It awoke his mind to a strange activity.
Out of the dim past he conjured up scenes which remained engrained in his
mind as sharp and distinct as events of yesterday. Amongst these was a
bright and vivid morning on the Janiculum Hill in Rome; the glorious city
spread beneath glittering in the morning beams.... A beautiful child
dancing and skipping in pure delight; a hasty dash under a high garden
wall, and down a narrow obscure lane.... Then again the depth of a dark,
rainy, hot, summer night, when he entered that self‐same room, weary with
travel and prolonged toil of search for his destination.... The deposit of
his tiny sleeping burden, and the astonished faces of the two inmates of
the room.
Fortune had favoured him; it was the reward of his humanity. As he looked
on the heedless maiden, his heart warmed with satisfaction; and for some
brief moments, he felt at peace with all and everything. How exquisite she
would look clothed as a white‐handed patrician and set in the marble halls
of a palace. Her beauty had utterly conquered him. It was a new and novel
experience to have lived in daily contact and companionship with a being
so delicate. Her sprightliness and spirit charmed him, whilst her purity
and gentleness softened and quelled him. It was no ordinary degree of
pride which tingled in his breast at the fact, that she was more indebted
to and more dependent upon him than any one, although she knew it not.
Should she learn now from his lips? The heart of this rough, vice‐sodden,
crime‐laden man beat like a girl’s as he contemplated the action, and
gazed on the exquisite profile before him. How those deep‐fringed orbs
would glow and flash in wonder, and the delicious curves of her lips
tremble with emotion! His cool reason was fast departing, and his tremor
increasing, as the fascination before his eyes hurried him on to the
consummation of his sudden desire. In two or three minutes more he could
not have resisted the temptation to hold the heart and soul of the fair
girl breathless at his disposal. All question of policy had fled, and he
was preparing for his task, when the grate and thud of a bolt being drawn,
sounded on their ears through the open door.
‘That is father!’ exclaimed Neæra, rousing herself suddenly and turning
round in expectation.
A deep sigh, either of relief or disappointment, escaped the lips of
Cestus, and he straightened up his body.
The creak of the potter’s workshop door was followed by his step, and the
next moment he entered the room and advanced toward them. They looked at
him in astonishment, for a wonderful change was in his aspect. He was
clearly in a state of great mental excitement, not to speak of evident
delight. The soot of the furnace on this occasion rather overspread and
subdued the reddish incrustation of clay on his person, and in his hand he
carried a globular vessel of dull, coarse‐looking glass. He held it up
before him as he entered, in such an eager manner, as to draw their
attention to it at once, without a word from his lips. His deep‐set eyes
sparkled in the firelight with infinite vivacity, as they flung their
flashing glances first from one to the other, and then to the cup in his
hand, and back again. His eager hurried step brought him up to the Suburan
and the maiden almost at a run, and then he stopped short, with the vessel
uplifted in one hand, and the forefinger of the other pointing to it. A
strange laugh, or chuckle of supreme joy or exultation, escaped him, and
he moved the article, with its accompanying index finger, first before the
face of Neæra and then of Cestus. They arose silently from their seats and
stared at the potter with strange wonder, and something of alarm, at this
unusual proceeding on the part of a man of habitual reserve and serenity.
It was a spectacle almost as little to be expected, as for a statue of the
grave goddess and her owl to step down from its plinth and cut a caper on
a temple floor. They saw that his features and his frame were trembling
with extreme agitation; and failing to comprehend its cause in a glass cup
of not the slightest pretensions to use or ornament, they remained, with
anxious gaze, to await some further development of such unwonted symptoms.
‘Look—it is done—it is found—I have found it—I, Masthlion!’ gasped the
potter, with another laugh. ‘At last—at last!’ he cried, rolling and
smoothing the vessel in his grimy hands, with the ecstasy of a miser
fondling his treasure heaps.
Grave doubts arose in the mind of Cestus as to the actual state of his
kinsman’s mind; and giving him a glance of suspicion, and another of
contempt on the paltry object of his delight, he growled as follows—‘As
far as I can see, potter, it is a thing that ought to be well lost beyond
redemption, and a thing of regret, if found again in any dusthole.’
Masthlion vented another chuckling laugh, and turned his eyes on the face
of Neæra, who rested her hand on his shoulder, and touched the glass with
the slender fingers of her other hand. Timidity and doubt were in her
actions and on her countenance. She returned his gaze with affectionate
concern and said soothingly, ‘You seemed pleased to have found it, father.
Had you lost it long? Why do you prize it? Tell me!’
‘It has never been lost; nevertheless I have but now found it. Ha, ha!
Child, do you think I have taken leave of my wits? And, indeed, I think I
have, for joy,’ laughed Masthlion, straining the girl to his breast and
giving her a fervent kiss. ‘Go, bring your mother!’
Neæra glided away into the upper regions of the house on her mission; and,
at the request of Masthlion, Cestus took a brand from the fire and lighted
an iron lamp which hung from the ceiling. By the time the feeble flame
threw its cheerless light upon the scene, Neæra returned with Tibia. The
latter, with probably a hint of her husband’s unusual humour, came forward
in a peculiar roundabout fashion, as though she were describing the
segment of a circle with the potter as a centre. Her face, wreathed in
wonder and some fear, was riveted on his, throughout her course, as if her
head were magnetised. When she arrived finally on the opposite side of
him, she stopped. Masthlion regarded her with an amused smile, and Cestus
grinned, almost audibly. Neæra, standing at one side, glanced from one to
the other, with a slight wrinkling of her brows, and drew a step nearer
Tibia; but the dame remained absorbed in her husband, and indifferent to
the amusement her odd manner had caused.
‘Husband!’ she ejaculated at last. ‘What is the matter?’
‘’Tis what I sent to tell you,’ he said, laughing. ‘Look!’ He seized her
hand, and held up the vessel before her eyes in the same way he had done
to the others. ‘Here is the result of twenty‐five years’ toil and
patience. Here, at last, is success, after disappointments and bitterness
beyond my tongue to tell. Do you remember the old times, wife? Ay, can you
ever forget them? They were too well ground into you—starvation and rags
are not easily forgotten. I was the cause; and though you often blamed me
and reproached me in your heart, you never murmured.’
Tibia shook her head gently.
‘Well, well, I deserved it, at least. I was a man possessed with an idea
and no money—an unlucky combination for mortals who are obliged to eat to
live. I learnt my trade as a youth, and one day in my master’s shop I
chanced upon a piece of refuse glass of peculiar quality. I showed it to
my master, but he scarcely looked at it. He was a man of no ideas beyond
his daily work. There was that about this piece of glass, however, which
set me thinking, and filled me with an idea of such strength as to be
called infatuation. It has been like a stone of Sisyphus to me till this
day, and now I have conquered it. For twenty‐five years I have worked to
discover the secret of that stray piece of glass, more or less
madly—eagerly—according to circumstances, but always constantly. My
father, when he died, left me a little hoard of money. Then I left my
master and built a workshop of my own. It was then, too, I married my
sweetheart; and like a young, eager, hot‐blooded, thoughtless lad, would
have laughed to scorn the notion of a space of twenty‐five years being
necessary to the working out of my problem, had it been told to me at that
time. “Come,” I said to myself, “my money will keep us a couple of years,
and by that time, I shall have found out my secret, and fortune will lie
before me.” In two years I was as far off the end as ever—do you remember,
Tibia? In three years I was further still, for we had struggled on, in
vain hope that each day would solve the mystery, and my patrimony had come
to an end in the process. Every experiment was as futile as the one before
it, and I had become numb even to bitter disgust and despair. Ah, and how
I worked! Night and day—it was like a fever dream. And you, Tibia, would
come to help—it was your presence that helped more than your hands, wife.
Then came the day when the last coin had been spent in fuel for the
furnace, and the experiment had failed as miserably as all the others
before it. It was dusk as I tested my work and found it wanting, and I sat
down stupid and sick. I began to dream horribly, or else a fever had
reached my brain. I sat there like a helpless log, as if bound hand and
foot, whilst the walls seemed to dance around me in a giddy whirl, and the
roof to rear up and swoop down upon me with a frightful sensation that
will live in my memory till I die. Then in that dread hour it was you who
crept in beside me. Yet you did nothing but lay your hand silently on
mine, and that saved me. You remember it, Tibia?—I cried like a girl. I
was overwrought in mind and body. I was like the steel blade which is
strained in a curve beyond its strength, and then snaps, to spring and
quiver no more. That night we begged our supper, and next morning I rose
another being. I was a dreaming youth no longer, and I set to work to make
pots like my dull master, and allow my phantasy to find its opportunities
for indulgence, when time and means allowed. I did not do this from change
of inclination, for my ambition burned as strongly as ever; but to live
was a necessity. The gods gave me patience, and I toiled for livelihood,
and for means to give me leisure to resume my search. The gods have
blessed me in both: we are beyond fear of want, and I have, at last,
discovered the secret which led me on, like a will‐o’‐the‐wisp, for all
these years. Here it is to bless us—me, for my toil, and you, wife, for
your patience and long‐suffering! I was cruel in those early years. Many a
time since then have I acknowledged it. But I was possessed—eaten up too
much with my own mad hopes and visions to be able to see a wife pinched
and starved. Heaven knows, wife, what your thoughts were in those days!
You never spoke, and I dare not ask. Now I may be able to repay—who knows?
At least the secret is found, whatever it may lead to. If it was ever
known to the world before I know not; but I have heard the scholars say,
that the most ancient people, the Egyptians, in their days of power, were
skilled in works beyond the comprehension of these days. Yet their
knowledge is all buried, forgotten, lost, like their temples and cities.
What they knew and discovered will have to be sought for again. Thus this
matter of mine may once have been known well enough, when the world was
ages younger, in the days of the giants. Let that be or not; it is of no
consequence to me or any one. It is enough for me to think, that no one
lives and breathes who saw, or ever heard, of such a glass cup as this
which now I hold. What would you say, now, if it were impossible to break
this vessel? What would the wealthy patrician think, if his costly glass
treasure, goblet, or heirloom should be of such composition that his
careless slaves should be powerless to harm it?—that the delicate fabric,
exquisitely cut and designed, brilliantly pictured and tinted, instead of
being dashed to fragments on his floor by the clumsy fingers of a slave,
should be so durable as to survive the mishap, and be lifted again, with
nothing worse than a dent, which a skilful artist could restore? And of
the priceless gem of the artist, so of the humble vessels of the kitchen.
That stray fragment of glass which set my brain on fire, and gave me five‐
and‐twenty years of toil and unceasing thought, by some strange trick of
chance, had been fused with certain properties in certain proportions.
Chance had accomplished what it has taken me all these years to find out,
and there, at last, its composition is developed. Watch now and you shall
see how this piece of glass is matched by none in existence!’
Masthlion’s face was flushed with tumultuous speech. His trembling hand
pulled his wife aside to give himself more room. Then he lifted the glass
bowl as high as possible above his head, and threw it down on the floor,
with all the force he could command. There followed no crash and flying of
countless splinters, but only a dull thud, and the hardly tried glass
rolled over lazily two or three times with a flattened side; otherwise it
had suffered no damage. The potter drew himself up and looked round with
pride and triumph in his eyes.
Neæra clapped her hands and kissed him. Her face reflected his supreme joy
and satisfaction. Tibia stood silently, with her hand still grasped in her
husband’s, as it might be in the manner of those bygone days of trial he
had told them of. She said nothing; but her eyes passed from the object on
the floor to her husband’s face, and there remained. She was a silent
woman, and spoke no word of congratulation; but the pride and devotion in
her face were eloquent enough. Masthlion, looking down into it, read it
there. Both females regarded the wonderful piece of glass with no small
amount of curiosity; but it was little else than mere curiosity. As an
extraordinary discovery it interested them but little; as the means of
bearing rapture to the breast of the discoverer it was precious beyond
compare. Their eyes indeed visited it, but straightway left it to dwell on
the recovered radiance which beamed on the face of its maker.
The attention of Cestus, on the other hand, was absorbed in exactly the
reverse way. With great interest he stooped to pick up and examine the
flattened glass vessel. He turned and twisted it about with the most
minute scrutiny. Then, with his thick, powerful fingers, he tried to
straighten out the dint. But in this he was unsuccessful, so he began to
shake his head and hum disbelievingly through his pursed lips.
‘’Tis not clay,’ laughed Masthlion; ‘it needs a mallet and a tool or two.
Come, I will show you!’
They followed him to his workshop, where he took a piece of wood rounded
at one end like a pestle. With this and a mallet he pounded the injured
side of the glass back into its original shape—the glass yielding to the
heavy blows like a piece of plastic metal.
‘There!’ he cried, throwing down his tools and holding forth the restored
glass in triumph, ‘it is neither pretty nor useful, I admit; but the
principle is there, which is everything. One must first find the precious
pebble before it can be carved and polished. So enough for the present.
Haste, wife, and get us our supper—I must be at work again to make a more
sightly cup, as quickly as I can.’
The women vanished. Their voices could be heard in animated chatter as
they passed hither and thither in the gladdest preparation of a meal they
had known for some time.
‘Well, kinsman, you say nothing. What do you think of my bantling in
glass?’ said Masthlion to the Suburan, who stood leaning against a bench
with folded arms and knitted brows.
‘’Tis something undoubtedly new, potter,’ replied Cestus. ‘And do you say
you can make clear glass and fancy cups and vases, such as one sees in
Rome, in the same way—unbreakable?’
‘Certainly—why not?’ answered Masthlion. ‘No shape, colour, or fashion
whatever can make any difference to its principle of indestructibility.’
‘Why then, potter, I may safely give you joy of your new fashion. It has
been a long time coming, but it has come at last. And provided you can
keep your secret, and deal sensibly with it, I should say you ought to
coin money. Give me your hand, kinsman—you’ll be as rich as Caesar! And
recollect when your secret has two in it, it is no secret at all.’
‘Trust me for that!’ laughed Masthlion, as Cestus gripped his hand.
‘And yet something more, potter. This little affair must needs take you to
Rome. You may as well wrap up your piece of glass, with the secret of its
making on a parchment inside, and go bury them in your garden, as stop in
this place to make wealth.’
‘There is nothing to prevent me going on making glass here as heretofore,’
replied Masthlion, with a shadow stealing over his face.
‘Nothing!’ returned Cestus energetically, ‘even if you lived for the next
hundred years. But what an ending to your twenty‐five years’ work! Cradled
and buried in these hills for the benefit of housewives and kitchen
wenches round about Surrentum! No; you must have a wider market for your
wares and your name. Rome is the market of the world, and to Rome all the
world looks for the latest fashion. There is where name and fame is to be
had, and everything which follows name and fame. There you will find the
powerful patron to father your handicraft—and a powerful patron is
everything, kinsman, even in the matter of glass cups.’
‘What I have toiled for so long, and at last brought to light, will be to
the direct use and service of the world. So much so that the world will
find it out and accept it. It will matter little whether it goes to Rome
or to Surrentum to obtain it.’
‘Ha! ha!’ laughed Cestus sarcastically; ‘much you know about the world and
its people to say that! Do you think they will come and kneel down when
you lift your finger? You have enough to bring you fortune if you go the
right way to get it. The wrong way is to stay here and dabble, or,
perhaps, let some one else worm your secret to better purpose. This is
what you are bound to do. Go to Rome. Make a cup or vase, of the finest
workmanship you can turn out. Then choose you out a great man, and show
him your curiosity. The more people about him at the time, the better
chance of being talked about. If the noble will buy your vase, so much the
better. At any rate be assured that it shall have a place on his table. To
effect all this is to bring success, if there is anything in your
discovery at all. But, however, there is luck about all things. The best
schemes, at times, fall flat—no one knows why, whilst the worthless send
people crazy together. You must do your best and take your chance of the
humour of the time. This is the way to push business—the only way—’tis
done every day—pooh, man! If I knew what you know, and had your handicraft
at my finger ends, should I stop here? Not I! I should be off into the
world and tap a gold mine. Then, if it suited my fancy, in a few years
come back to the old nest and build myself a palace.’
‘Even with my plain, simple country ideas, Cestus, I think I have
something of good sense beyond your own,’ said Masthlion quietly, at the
end of his companion’s speech.
‘Really, in what way, kinsman?’
‘In that I have not yet allowed my mind to measure the extent of my
palace, or the worth of the gold mine that is to build it,’ said the
potter grimly.
‘Ah!’ said Cestus, ‘but observe, I spoke only assuming you to be
successful. If you haven’t enough faith in your own discovery to give you
hope, then, of course, there is an end.’
‘I have faith, and great faith! Else would I have toiled so long and
wearily? Its worth is plain to the dullest sense; but when success comes,
then it will be time to allow the mind to run riot. Nevertheless, Cestus,
it may astonish you to know, that ere you spoke, I had already resolved on
a plan of making my discovery known, which very much resembles the plan
you advise—and without need of leaving my home.’
The Suburan shook his head.
‘Simple being as I am, I have already the idea that a good patron is
necessary.’
‘Of course.’
‘Then, since that is settled, I have resolved that my patron shall be the
most powerful of all—the ruler of the world, in fact. To‐morrow, if I can
be ready, I will go and show the fruit of my labour for the approval of
Caesar himself.’
‘What—Caesar!’ cried Cestus, starting violently.
‘Caesar—Tiberius Claudius Nero Caesar,’ replied Masthlion, with a quiet
smile at the blank amazement on the features of his companion.
‘Biberius Caldius Mero Caesar—phew!’ muttered Cestus, mechanically giving
the Emperor his well‐known nickname, which his Imperial wine‐bibbing
propensities had earned for him.
So murmuring, the Suburan sank back again into his reclining posture
against the bench, glaring at the potter.
‘Why, it would seem that I have taken a bolder flight than even the city
wit and cleverness of my Roman kinsman could devise.’
‘There is such a thing as taking too bold a flight for one’s welfare,’
replied the other, recovering his voice; ‘and country ignorance will
plainly do many a thing which city wit would call folly. Had it been the
last Caesar now—had it been Augustus, perhaps you would have been
sensible. But this one! To go to Capreae—to run the risk of being drowned,
or spitted, ere you set foot in the tiger’s lair—or, failing that, to be
hauled before the tiger himself, and straightway hurled from the cliffs
into the sea for a mad‐brained potter! Gods preserve us, Masthlion—have
you taken leave of your senses?’
‘I may have seemed like it some minutes back, but I have returned into my
usual sober spirit now. At all events, I have the wit to see clearly what
I intend to do.’
‘You would never see Caesar—you would never be allowed to approach within
eyeshot—not even to set foot on shore!’
‘Nonsense, kinsman! Do you think we of Surrentum know not better than to
believe an idle tale such as that? Do you think we are not better
acquainted with our neighbours in Capreae, at our very doors here, than to
be affrighted at such an ogre’s fable as yours? I will both set foot on
the island and see Caesar to boot. Is it not often done by the folk along
the coast here, whenever business demands?’
‘And who never return. What of the dozens who are tortured and strangled
and flung to the sharks by the blood‐thirsty old hermit?’
‘Would the people ever continue to go if that were the case?’
‘Do you say none are treated in the way I say?’
‘There may be some so unlucky if they have offended; and Caesar is
somewhat harsh and imperious as tyrants often are. But I am a neighbour
and a Surrentine, and can make a fair reason for permission to go into
Caesar’s presence—I have no fear or uneasiness. Stercus of the vineyard up
there, frequently goes to Capreae and enters the Imperial presence.’
‘By Hercules! I would I had known this before,’ quoth Cestus eagerly;
‘would it be possible for me to do the same thing?’
‘I should not like to say,’ answered Masthlion, shaking his head;
‘strangers, from a distance, seem to be out of favour on the island. We
natives have more license. Why, I know not; but strangers—especially those
who go without authority, or business—will most likely rue their boldness.
If you, a Roman, were to make a visit, out of sheer curiosity, you would,
most likely, meet with rough handling.’
‘Humph, then there is some advantage in being a Surrentine and not a
Roman,’ said Cestus ironically.
‘So it would seem, in this instance,’ replied the potter.
‘Then you may claim it with pleasure. It is hardly worth having when it
includes the probability of becoming a meal for the fishes. And even what
I have heard the Surrentines themselves say of old Tiberius, gives me no
better relish for him than I had before. Therefore I say, don’t go! Take
your wares to a safer market. Even suppose you were safe enough in the
ordinary way of things, as a native, a little matter might upset the
Imperial humour—a slip, a word, heaven knows what! The royal humour might
be upset even before you had the first chance at it, and then what next?
What glass pot would save you then?’
‘I would never run the risk. I have the means of lying by till the sky is
favourable,’ returned Masthlion, with a calm smile.
‘You are resolved then?’
‘Quite.’
‘A wilful man will have his way,’ growled Cestus, pulling at his beard
nervously. He was very ill at ease, and he knew enough of the potter’s
nature, to be well aware of the uselessness of any arguments to turn his
determination when once arrived at. He felt no confidence in what he had
heard concerning the peculiar privileges in Capreae toward the natives of
the district, and, in fact, was more than half assured, in his own mind,
that his kinsman was running as great a risk, as if he were going empty‐
handed to a lion in its den. What if he never came back—if he was never
heard of again? It would be to lose the most important witness in his
case. That would be a terrible misfortune. The Suburan’s heart was a load
within him for heaviness. Perplexity worried him very soon into a temper,
and he stood with brows clenched, and teeth grinding under his bearded
lips, whilst Masthlion proceeded calmly with the preparations for his
expedition.
It seemed to increase Cestus’s irritation to watch his tranquillity.
‘You seem to be tolerably easy, in your own mind, I must confess,’ he
snarled at length.
Masthlion looked round, and noted the ill‐humoured expression of his
companion’s countenance with some surprise.
‘Easy in my own mind,’ said he; ‘I am, truly enough—I feel more contented
and happy than I have done for many a day; and I have good reason too, I
think.’
‘Be sure it is not an evil omen,’ said Cestus.
‘Of what?’
‘Ruin—death!’
‘Tush—you are talking nonsense. Set your mind at rest; I know what I am
about, and nothing shall stop me from carrying out what I have fixed
upon.’
‘Then if I cannot teach you common prudence, perhaps you will listen to
some one else. Your life and your carcase are your own, and you can do
what you like with them; but there are matters other than your own, and
also people dependent on you, who ought to have some consideration. Have
you told your wife and the girl what you mean to do?’
‘No; but it means only the telling,’ replied Masthlion, with the faintest
hesitation.
‘I am not so sure of that; and besides it is your duty not to run any risk
on their account.’
‘Nothing venture nothing win. As I have told you, you have got silly
fancies into your head. The risk I run does not trouble my conscience on
the score of those I leave behind me; so have done, Cestus, and trouble me
no more.’
Cestus approached him, and taking his arm with one hand he pointed to the
door with the other. ‘Do you forget, also, what duty you owe to the girl
singing within there? You say you love her like your own child—do you
forget that you are one of the chief witnesses in the task of restoring
her to her proper station?’
A shadow fell on the potter’s face and his frame shivered. ‘No, I do not
forget—how could I?’ he murmured, as his head fell on his breast. ‘You
will take her from me.’
‘I will take her to Rome—it will be necessary for you and Tibia to
accompany us. Where, then, is the separation? You settle in Rome, and
carry on your work nigh at hand. The matter is ripe and will wait no
longer. Within these two days I had resolved to tell you. I have written
to her grandfather to expect her, and we must go. Come, let us go in to
supper and settle it; but without, as yet, telling the reason. You cannot
but see that all this suits you in every way—nothing better.’
Masthlion remained silent for a few moments, with his head cast down and
his fingers twining themselves nervously. Then he went apart, and stooped
low on his bench, with his face in his hands. Here he remained for several
minutes motionless, during which time Cestus began to pace impatiently up
and down the floor. At length the potter stood up. The old care and
heaviness was back on his face once more, from the burden of which he had
had such a brief respite.
‘Cestus,’ he said huskily, ‘for my sake and my wife’s, and it may be for
hers for all that I can tell, I wish occasion had never been to have
brought you back again. We must suffer; but that is nothing if it be for
her good. I have of late thought over what you have said. In one way and
another it seems fated that she must leave us. I have also thought that
our home here would be very dark without her, or even the consolation of
knowing that she was within easy reach. I had half resolved, therefore, to
follow to the city. She may be lost to us, it is true; but still they
could not rob us altogether of the sight of her. That—that, at least,
would be a comfort. This will decide me then. As soon as I return from
Capreae we will go, and, at least, make a trial of a new home—though it is
a hard task to transplant old trees.’
‘As soon as you return from Capreae!’ echoed Cestus, his incipient
satisfaction giving way in a breath to disgust. ‘You will still persist in
that madness. It must never be! You have no need of Caesar—what benefit to
you is a man who lives like a hermit on a rock? The rich nobles in Rome
will be a thousand times the service to you—you shall not go!’
‘I will!’ cried Masthlion, stung into anger and despair by the fierce tone
of his kinsman; ‘I will do my duty to the labour of my life—its fame shall
be mine and shall cling to me though everything fall away.’
‘Life included,’ sneered Cestus.
‘Let it, if it be so fated. It seems less bright than it did.’