_THE CRIME_
‘Une grande reine, fille, femme, mère de rois si puissants.’
--BOSSUET, _Oraison Funèbre d’Henriette de France_.
‘Boletos ... optimi quidem hos cibi, sed immenso exemplo
in crimen adductos.’--PLINY, _N. H._ xxii. 46.
A fortnight had elapsed since the evening which we have described.
Claudius, worn out with the heavy cares of state, to which he
always devoted a conscientious, if somewhat bewildered, attention,
had fallen into ill health, which was increased by his unhappy
intemperance. Unwilling at all times to allow himself a holiday,
even in his advancing years, he had at last been persuaded to visit
Sinuessa, near the mouth of the River Vulturnus, in the hope that its
charming climate and healing waters might restore him to his usual
strength. He had there enjoyed a few days of quiet, during which his
suspicions had been lulled to sleep by the incessant assiduities of
Agrippina. His children had accompanied him, and Agrippina had been
forced to conceal the furious jealousy with which she witnessed the
signs of affection which he began to lavish upon them. She did not
dare to delay any longer the terrible crime which she had for some
time meditated. She stood on the edge of a precipice. There was
peril in every day’s procrastination. What if Pallas, whose scruples
she had witnessed, should feel an impulse of repentance--should
fling himself at his master’s feet, confess all, and hurry her to
execution, as Narcissus had hurried Messalina? The weak mind of
Claudius was easily stirred to suspicions. He had already shown
marked signs of uneasiness. Halotus, Xenophon, Locusta--they knew
all. Could so frightful a secret be kept? Might not any whisper or
any accident reveal it? If she would end this harassing uncertainty
and reap the glittering reward of crime, there must be no delay.
She had intended to carry out the fatal deed at Sinuessa, but
Claudius felt restless; and as a few days of country air had
refreshed his health and spirits, he hurried back to Rome on October
13, A.D. 54. She felt that, if she was not prompt, Narcissus, the
vigilant guardian of his master, might return, and the opportunity
might slip away for ever.
They had scarcely reached the Palace when she bade Acerronia to
summon Halotus to her presence as secretly as possible.
The eunuch entered--a wrinkled and evil specimen of humanity, who had
grown grey in the household of Claudius.
‘The Emperor,’ she said, ‘is far from well. His appetite needs to
be enticed by the most delicate kinds of food. You will see that his
tastes are consulted in the supper of this evening.’
‘Madam,’ said the slave, ‘there is nothing of which the noble
Claudius is fonder than boletus mushrooms. They are scarce, but a
small dish of them has been procured.’
‘Let them be brought here, that I may see them.’
Halotus returned in a few moments, followed by a slave, who set the
mushrooms before her on a silver dish, and retired. They were few in
number, but one was peculiarly fine.
‘I will consult the physician Xenophon, whether they will suit the
Emperor’s health,’ said Agrippina. ‘He is in attendance.’
Passing into an adjoining room, which was empty, she hastily drew
from her bosom the little box which Locusta had given her, and
sprinkled the yellow flakes and powder among the sporules on the
pink inner surface of the mushroom. Then returning she said,
‘Halotus, this dainty must be reserved for the table of the Emperor
alone, and I design this mushroom particularly for him. He will be
pleased at the care which I have taken to stimulate his appetite. And
if I have reason to be satisfied with you, your freedom is secured
--your fortune made.’
The eunuch bowed; but as he left the room he thrust his tongue into
his cheek, and his wrinkled face bore an ugly smile.
The evening came. The supper party was small, for Claudius still
longed for quiet, and had been glad, in the retirement of Sinuessa,
to lay aside the superb state of the imperial household. Usually
when he was at Rome the hall was crowded with guests; but on this
day he had desired that only a few friends should be present. At the
_sigma_, or semicircular table at which he reclined, there were no
others except Agrippina, who was next to him, Pallas, Octavia, and
Nero. Burrus, the commander of the Prætorian camp, was in attendance,
and Seneca, Nero’s tutor; but they were at another sigma, with one or
two distinguished senators who had been asked to meet them.
Except Halotus and Pallas, there was not one person in the room who
had the least suspicion of the tragedy which was about to be enacted.
Yet there fell on all the guests one of those unaccountable spells
of silence and depression which are so often the prelude to great
calamities. At the lower table, indeed, Burrus tried to enliven the
guests with the narrative of scenes which he had witnessed in Germany
and Britain in days of active service, and told once more how he had
received the wound which disabled his left hand. But to these stories
they listened with polite apathy, nor could they be roused from their
languor by the studied impromptus of Seneca. At the upper table Nero,
startled by a few vague words which his mother had dropped early in
the day, was timid and restless. The young Octavia--she was but
fourteen years old--was habitually taciturn in the presence of
her husband, Nero, who even in these early days had conceived an
aversion, which he was not always able to conceal, for the bride who
had been forced upon him by his mother’s ambition. Claudius talked
but little, for he was intent, as usual, on the pleasures of the
table, and all conversation with him soon became impossible, as he
drained goblet after goblet of Massic wine. Agrippina alone affected
cheerfulness as she congratulated the Emperor on his improving
health, and praised the wisdom which had at last induced him to
yield to her loving entreaties, and to take a much-needed holiday.
‘And now, Cæsar,’ she said, ‘I have a little surprise for you. There
is, I know, nothing which you like better than these rare boleti.
They are entirely for ourselves. I shall take some; the rest are for
you, especially this--the finest I could procure.’
With her own white and jewelled hand she took from the dish the fatal
mushroom, and handed it to her husband. He greedily ate the dainty,
and thanked her. Not long after he looked wildly round him, tried in
vain to speak, rose from the table, and, staggering, fell back into
the arms of the treacherous Halotus.
The unfortunate Emperor was carried out of the triclinium by his
attendants. Such an end of the banquet was common enough after he
had sat long over the wine, but that he should be removed so suddenly
before the supper was half over was an unwonted circumstance.
The slaves had carried him into the adjoining Nymphæum, a room
adorned with rare plants, and were splashing his face with the water
of the fountain. Xenophon was summoned, and gave orders that he
should be at once conveyed to his chamber. The guests caught one
last glimpse of his senseless form as the slaves hurriedly carried
it back through the dining-hall.
Seneca and Burrus exchanged terrified glances, but no word was spoken
until Agrippina whispered to Pallas to dismiss the guests. He rose,
and told them that the Emperor had suddenly been taken ill, but
that the illness did not seem to be serious. A night’s rest would
doubtless set him right. Meanwhile the Empress was naturally anxious,
and as she desired to tend her suffering husband, it was better that
all strangers should take their farewell.
As they departed, they heard her ordering the preparation of heated
cloths and fomentations, as she hurried to the sick room. The Emperor
lay gasping and convulsed, sometimes unconscious, sometimes in a
delirium of agony; and it was clear that the quantities of wine
which he had drunk might tend to dilute the poison, possibly even
to counteract its working. Hour after hour passed by, and Claudius
still breathed. Xenophon, the treacherous physician, saw the danger.
Assuring those present in the chamber of the dying man that quiet was
essential to his recovery, he urged the Empress to have the room
cleared, and to take upon herself the duties of nurse. His commands
were obeyed, and under pretence that he might produce some natural
relief by irritating the throat, Xenophon sent for a large feather.
The feather of a flamingo was brought, and when the slaves had
retired, he smeared it with a rapid and deadly poison. The effect
was instant. The swollen form of the Emperor heaved with the spasm
of a last struggle, and he lay dead before them.
Not a tear did Agrippina shed, not one sigh broke from the murderess,
as her uncle and husband breathed his last.
‘It must not be known that he is dead,’ she whispered. ‘Watch here.
I will give out that he has fallen into a refreshing sleep, and will
probably awake in his accustomed health. Fear not for your reward; it
shall be immense when my Nero reigns. But much has first to be done.’
She hurried to her room, and despatched messengers in all directions,
though it was now near midnight. She sent to the Priests, bidding
them to offer vows to all the gods for the Emperor’s safety; she
ordered the Consuls to convoke the Senate, and gave them secret
directions that, while they prayed for Claudius, they should be
prepared for all emergencies. Special despatches were sent to Seneca
and Burrus. The former was to prepare an address which Nero might, if
necessary, pronounce before the Senate; the latter was to repair to
the Palace at earliest dawn and await the issue of events.
Meanwhile she gave the strictest orders that the Palace gates should
be guarded, and that none should be allowed to enter or to leave
unless they could produce written permission. All this was easy for
her. The Palace was full of her creatures. Britannicus and Octavia
had been gradually deprived of nearly all who were known to be
faithful to their interests. They were kept in profound ignorance
that death had robbed them of the one natural protector, who loved
them with a tenderness which had often been obscured by the bedazed
character of his intellect, but which had never been for one moment
quenched. All that they learnt from the spies and traitors who
were placed about their persons was that the Emperor had been taken
suddenly ill, but was already recovering, and was now in a peaceful
slumber.
Having taken all these precautions, and secured that no one except
Pallas or herself should be admitted during the night into the room
where Xenophon kept watch beside the corpse, Agrippina retired to
her chamber. One thing alone troubled her. Before she retired she had
looked for a moment on the nightly sky, and saw on the far horizon a
gleam unknown to her. She called her Greek astrologer and asked him
what it was. He paused, and for a moment looked alarmed. ‘It is a
comet,’ he said.
‘Is that an omen of disaster?’
The learned slave was too politic to give it that interpretation. ‘It
may,’ he said, ‘portend the brilliant inauguration of a new reign.’
She was reassured by the answer, and laid herself down to rest.
Though greatly excited by the events of the day, and the immense
cares which fell upon her, she slept as sweetly as a child. No pale
faces looked in upon her slumber; no shriek rang through her dreams;
no fancy troubled her of gibbering spectre or Fury from the abyss.
She had given orders that she should be awakened in a few hours,
and by the time that the first grey light shuddered in the east she
had dressed herself in rich array, and, with a sense of positive
exultation, stepped out of her room, calm and perfumed, to achieve
that which had been for years the main ambition of her life.