THE BED-CHAMBER.
It is now time to resume our chronicle of the eventful night which
marked the destruction of Antonina's lute and the conspiracy against
Antonina's honour.
The gates of Vetranio's palace were closed, and the noises in it were
all hushed; the banquet was over, the triumph of the Nightingale Sauce
had been achieved, and the daybreak was already glimmering in the
eastern sky, when the senator's favoured servant, the freedman Carrio,
drew back the shutter of the porter's lodge, where he had been dozing
since the conclusion of the feast, and looked out lazily into the
street. The dull, faint light of dawn was now strengthening slowly
over the lonely roadway and on the walls of the lofty houses. Of the
groups of idlers of the lowest class who had assembled during the
evening in the street to snuff the fragrant odours which steamed afar
from Vetranio's kitchens, not one remained; men, women, and children
had long since departed to seek shelter wherever they could find it,
and to fatten their lean bodies on what had been charitable bestowed on
them of the coarser relics of the banquet. The mysterious solitude and
tranquility of daybreak in a great city prevailed over all things.
Nothing impressed, however, by the peculiar and solemn attraction of
the scene at this moment, the freedman apostrophised the fresh morning
air, as it blew over him, in strong terms of disgust, and even ventured
in lowered tones to rail against his master's uncomfortable fancy for
being awakened after a feast at the approach of dawn. Far too well
aware, nevertheless, of the necessity of yielding the most implicit
obedience to the commands he had received to resign himself any longer
to the pleasant temptations of repose, Carrio, after yawning, rubbing
his eyes, and indulging for a few moments more in the luxury of
complaint, set forth in earnest to follow the corridors leading to the
interior of the palace, and to awaken Vetranio without further delay.
He had not advanced more than a few steps when a proclamation, written
in letters of gold on a blue-coloured board, and hung against the wall
at his side, attracted his attention. This public notice, which
delayed his progress at the very outset, and which was intended for the
special edification of all the inhabitants of Rome, was thus
expressed:--
'ON THIS DAY, AND FOR TEN DAYS FOLLOWING, THE AFFAIRS OF OUR PATRON
OBLIGE HIM TO BE ABSENT FROM ROME.'
Here the proclamation ended, without descending to particulars. It had
been put forth, in accordance with the easy fashion of the age, to
answer at once all applications at Vetranio's palace during the
senator's absence. Although the colouring of the board, the writing of
the letters, and the composition of the sentence were the work of his
own ingenuity, the worthy Carrio could not prevail upon himself to pass
the proclamation without contemplating its magnificence anew. For some
time he stood regarding it with the same expression of lofty and
complacent approbation which we see in these modern days illuminating
the countenance of a connoisseur before one of his own old pictures
which he has bought as a great bargain, or dawning over the bland
features of a linen-draper as he surveys from the pavement his
morning's arrangement of the window of the shop. All things, however,
have their limits, even a man's approval of an effort of his own skill.
Accordingly, after a prolonged review of the proclamation, some faint
ideas of the necessity of immediately obeying his master's commands
revived in the mind of the judicious Carrio, and counselled him to turn
his steps at once in the direction of the palace sleeping apartments.
Greatly wondering what new caprice had induced the senator to
contemplate leaving Rome at the dawn of day--for Vetranio had divulged
to no one the object of his departure--the freedman cautiously entered
his master's bed-chamber. He drew aside the ample silken curtains
suspended around and over the sleeping couch, from the hands of Graces
and Cupids sculptured in marble; but the statues surrounded an empty
bed. Vetranio was not there. Carrio next entered the bathroom; the
perfumed water was steaming in its long marble basin, and the soft
wrapping-cloths lay ready for use; the attendant slave, with his
instruments of ablution, waited, half asleep, in his accustomed place;
but here also no signs of the master's presence appeared. Somewhat
perplexed, the freedman examined several other apartments. He found
guests, dancing girls, parasites, poets, painters--a motley
crew--occupying every kind of dormitory, and all peacefully engaged in
sleeping off the effects of the wine they had drunk at the banquet; but
the great object of his search still eluded him as before. At last it
occurred to him that the senator, in an excess of convivial enthusiasm
and jovial hospitality, might yet be detaining some favoured guest at
the table of the feast.
Pausing, therefore, at some carved doors which stood ajar at one
extremity of a spacious hall, he pushed them open, and hurriedly
entered the banqueting-room beyond.
A soft, dim, luxurious light reigned over this apartment, which now
presented, as far as the eye could discern, an aspect of confusion that
was at once graceful and picturesque. Of the various lamps, of every
variety of pattern, hanging from the ceiling, but few remained alight.
From those, however, which were still unextinguished there shone a mild
brightness, admirably adapted to display the objects immediately around
them. The golden garlands and the alabaster pots of sweet ointment
which had been suspended before the guests during the banquet, still
hung from the painted ceiling. On the massive table, composed partly
of ebony and partly of silver, yet lay, in the wildest confusion,
fragments of gastronomic delicacies, grotesque dinner services, vases
of flowers, musical instruments, and crystal dice; while towering over
all rose the glittering dish which had contained the nightingales
consumed by the feasters, with the four golden Cupids which had spouted
over them that illustrious invention--the Nightingale Sauce. Around
the couches, of violet and rose colour, ranged along the table, the
perfumed and gaily-tinted powders that had been strewn in patterns over
the marble floor were perceptible for a few yards; but beyond this
point nothing more was plainly distinguishable. The eye roved down the
sides of the glorious chamber, catching dim glimpses of gorgeous
draperies, crowded statues, and marble columns, but discerning nothing
accurately, until it reached the half-opened windows, and rested upon
the fresh dewy verdure now faintly visible in the shady gardens
without. There--waving in the morning breezes, charged on every leaf
with their burden of pure and welcome moisture--rose the lofty
pine-trees, basking in the recurrence of the new day's beautiful and
undying youth, and rising in reproving contrast before the exhausted
allurements of luxury and the perverted creations of art which burdened
the tables of the hall within.
After a hasty survey of the apartment, the freedman appeared to be on
the point of quitting it in despair, when the noise of a falling dish,
followed by several partly suppressed and wholly confused exclamations
of affright, caught his ear. He once more approached the
banqueting-table, retrimmed a lamp that hung near him, and taking it in
his hand, passed to the side of the room whence the disturbance
proceeded. A hideous little negro, staring in ludicrous terror at a
silver oven, half filled with bread, which had just fallen beside him,
was the first object he discovered. A few paces beyond the negro
reposed a beautiful boy, crowned with vine leaves and ivy, still
sleeping by the side of his lyre; and farther yet, stretched in an
uneasy slumber on a silken couch, lay the identical object of the
freedman's search--the illustrious author of the Nightingale Sauce.
Immediately above the sleeping senator hung his portrait, in which he
was modestly represented as rising by the assistance of Minerva to the
top of Parnassus, the nine Muses standing round him rejoicing. At his
feet reposed a magnificent white cat, whose head rested in all the
luxurious laziness of satiety on the edge of a golden saucer half
filled with dormice stewed in milk. The most indubitable evidences of
the night's debauch appeared in Vetranio's disordered dress and flushed
countenance as the freedman regarded him. For some minutes the worthy
Carrio stood uncertain whether to awaken his master or not, deciding
finally, however, on obeying the commands he had received, and
disturbing the slumbers of the wearied voluptuary before him. To effect
this purpose, it was necessary to call in the aid of the singing-boy;
for, by a refinement of luxury, Vetranio had forbidden his attendants
to awaken him by any other method than the agency of musical sounds.
With some difficulty the boy was sufficiently aroused to comprehend the
service that was required of him. For a short time the notes of the
lyre sounded in vain. At last, when the melody took a louder and more
martial character, the sleeping patrician slowly opened his eyes and
stared vacantly around him.
'My respected patron,' said the polite Carrio in apologetic tones,
'commanded that I should awaken him with the dawn; the daybreak has
already appeared.'
When the freedman had ceased speaking, Vetranio sat up on the couch,
called for a basin of water, dipped his fingers in the refreshing
liquid, dried them abstractedly on the long silky curls of the
singing-boy who stood beside him, gazed about him once more, repeated
interrogatively the word 'daybreak', and sunk gently back upon his
couch. We are grieved to confess it--but the author of the Nightingale
Sauce was moderately inebriated.
A short pause followed, during which the freedman and the singing-boy
stared upon each other in mutual perplexity. At length the one resumed
his address of apology, and the other resumed his efforts on the lyre.
Once more, after an interval, the eyes of Vetranio lazily unclosed, and
this time he began to speak; but his thoughts--if thoughts they could
be called--were as yet wholly occupied by the 'table-talk' at the past
night's banquet.
'The ancient Egyptians--oh, sprightly and enchanting Camilla--were a
wise nation!' murmured the senator drowsily. 'I am myself descended
from the ancient Egyptians; and, therefore, I hold in high veneration
that cat in your lap, and all cats besides. Herodotus--an historian
whose works I feel a certain gratification in publicly mentioning as
good--informs us, that when a cat died in the dwelling of an ancient
Egyptian, the owner shaved his eyebrows as a mark of grief, embalmed
the defunct animal in a consecrated house, and carried it to be
interred in a considerable city of Lower Egypt, called 'Bubastis'--an
Egyptian word which I have discovered to mean The Sepulchre of all the
Cats; whence it is scarcely erroneous to infer--'
At this point the speaker's power of recollection and articulation
suddenly failed him, and Carrio--who had listened with perfect gravity
to his master's oration upon cats--took immediate advantage of the
opportunity now afforded him to speak again.
'The equipage which my patron was pleased to command to carry him to
Aricia,' said he, with a strong emphasis on the last word, 'now stands
in readiness at the private gate of the palace gardens.'
As he heard the word 'Aricia', the senator's powers of recollection and
perception seemed suddenly to return to him. Among that high order of
drinkers who can imbibe to the point of perfect enjoyment, and stop
short scientifically before the point of perfect oblivion, Vetranio
occupied an exalted rank. The wine he had swallowed during the night
had disordered his memory and slightly troubled his self-possession,
but had not deprived him of his understanding. There was nothing
plebeian even in his debauchery; there was an art and a refinement in
his very excesses.
'Aricia--Aricia!' he repeated to himself, 'ah! the villa that Julia
lent to me at Ravenna! The pleasures of the table must have obscured
for a moment the image of my beautiful pupil of other days, which now
revives before me again as Love resumes the dominion that Bacchus
usurped! My excellent Carrio,' he continued, speaking to the freedman,
'you have done perfectly right in awakening me; delay not a moment more
in ordering my bath to be prepared, or my man-monster Ulpius, the king
of conspirators and high priest of all that is mysterious, will wait
for me in vain! And you, Glyco,' he pursued, when Carrio had departed,
addressing the singing-boy, 'array yourself for a journey, and wait
with my equipage at the garden-gate. I shall require you to accompany
me in my expedition to Aricia. But first, oh! gifted and valued
songster, let me reward you for the harmonious symphony that has just
awakened me. Of what rank of my musicians are you at present, Glyco?'
'Of the fifth,' replied the boy.
'Were you bought, or born in my house?' asked Vetranio.
'Neither; but bequeathed to you by Geta's testament,' rejoined the
gratified Glyco.
'I advance you,' continued Vetranio, 'to the privileges and the pay of
the first rank of my musicians; and I give you, as a proof of my
continued favour, this ring. In return for these obligations, I desire
to keep secret whatever concerns my approaching expedition; to employ
your softest music in soothing the ear of a young girl who will
accompany us--in calming her terrors if she is afraid, in drying her
tears if she weeps; and finally, to exercise your voice and your lute
incessantly in uniting the name 'Antonina' to the sweetest harmonies of
sound that your imagination can suggest.'
Pronouncing these words with an easy and benevolent smile, and looking
round complacently on the display of luxurious confusion about him,
Vetranio retired to the bath that was to prepare him for his
approaching triumph.
Meanwhile a scene of a very different nature was proceeding without, at
Numerian's garden-gate. Here were no singing-boys, no freedmen, no
profusion of rich treasures--here appeared only the solitary and
deformed figure of Ulpius, half hidden among surrounding trees, while
he waited at his appointed post. As time wore on, and still Vetranio
did not appear, the Pagan's self-possession began to desert him. He
moved restlessly backwards and forwards over the soft dewy grass,
sometimes in low tones calling upon his gods to hasten the tardy
footsteps of the libertine patrician, who was to be made the instrument
of restoring to the temples the worship of other days--sometimes
cursing the reckless delay of the senator, or exulting in the treachery
by which he madly believed his ambition was at last to be fulfilled;
but still, whatever his words or thoughts, wrought up to the same pitch
of fierce, fanatic enthusiasm which had strengthened him for the
defence of his idols at Alexandria, and had nerved him against the
torment and misery of years in his slavery in the copper mines of Spain.
The precious moments were speeding irrevocably onwards. His impatience
was rapidly changing to rage and despair as he strained his eyes for
the last time in the direction of the palace gardens, and now at length
discerned a white robe among the distant trees. Vetranio was rapidly
approaching him.
Restored by his bath, no effect of the night's festivity but its
exhilaration remained in the senator's brain. But for a slight
uncertainty in his gait, and an unusual vacancy in his smile, the
elegant gastronome might now have appeared to the closest observer
guiltless of the influence of intoxicating drinks. He advanced,
radiant with exultation, prepared for conquest, to the place where
Ulpius awaited him, and was about to address the Pagan with that
satirical familiarity so fashionable among the nobles of Rome in their
communications with the people, when the object of his intended
pleasantries sternly interrupted him, saying, in tones more of command
than of advice, 'Be silent! If you would succeed in your purpose,
follow me without uttering a word!'
There was something so fierce and determined in the tones of the old
man's voice--low, tremulous, and husky though they were--as he uttered
those words, that the bold, confident senator instinctively held his
peace as he followed his stern guide into Numerian's house. Avoiding
the regular entrance, which at that early hour of the morning was
necessarily closed, Ulpius conducted the patrician through a small
wicket into the subterranean apartment, or rather outhouse, which was
his customary, though comfortless, retreat in his leisure hours, and
which was hardly ever entered by the other members of the Christian's
household.
From the low, arched brick ceiling of this place hung an earthenware
lamp, whose light, small and tremulous, left all the corners of the
apartment in perfect obscurity. The thick buttresses that projected
inwards from the walls, made visible by their prominence, displayed on
their surfaces rude representations of idols and temples drawn in
chalk, and covered with strange, mysterious hieroglyphics. On a block
of stone which served as a table lay some fragments of small statues,
which Vetranio recognised as having belonged to the old, accredited
representations of Pagan idols. Over the sides of the table itself
were scrawled in Latin characters these two words, 'Serapis',
'Macrinus'; and about its base lay some pieces of torn, soiled linen,
which still retained enough of their former character, both in shape,
size, and colour, to convince Vetranio that they had once served as the
vestments of a Pagan priest. Further than this the senator's
observation did not carry him, for the close, almost mephitic
atmosphere of the place already began to affect him unfavourably. He
felt a suffocating sensation in his throat and a dizziness in his head.
The restorative influence of his recent bath declined rapidly. The
fumes of the wine he had drunk in the night, far from having been, as
he imagined, permanently dispersed, again mounted to his head. He was
obliged to lean against the stone table to preserved his equilibrium as
he faintly desired the Pagan to shorten their sojourn in his miserable
retreat.
Without even noticing the request, Ulpius hurriedly proceeded to erase
the drawings on the buttresses and the inscriptions on the table. Then
collecting the fragments of statues and the pieces of linen, he
deposited them in a hiding-place in the corner of the apartment. This
done, he returned to the stone against which Vetranio supported
himself, and for a few minutes silently regarded the senator with a
firm, earnest, and penetrating gaze.
A dark suspicion that he had betrayed himself into the hands of a
villain, who was then plotting some atrocious project connected with
his safety or honour, began to rise on the senator's bewildered brain
as he unwillingly submitted to the penetrating examination of the
Pagan's glance. At that moment, however, the withered lips of the old
man slowly parted, and he began to speak. Whether as he looked on
Vetranio's disturbed countenance, and marked his unsteady gait, the
heart of Ulpius, for the first time since his introduction to the
senator, misgave him when he thought of their monstrous engagement; or
whether the near approach of the moment that was henceforth, as he
wildly imagined, to fix Vetranio as his assistant and ally, so
powerfully affected his mind that it instinctively sought to vent its
agitation through the natural medium of words, it is useless to
inquire. Whatever his motives for speech, the impressive earnestness
of his manner gave evidence of the depth and intensity of his emotions
as he addressed the senator thus:--
'I have submitted to servitude in a Christian's house, I have suffered
the contamination of a Christian's prayers, to gain the use of your
power and station when the time to employ them should arrive. The hour
has now come when my part of the conditions of our engagement is to be
performed; the hour will yet come when your part shall be exacted from
you in turn! Do you wonder at what I have done and what I will do? Do
you marvel that a household drudge should speak thus to a nobleman of
Rome? Are you astonished that I risk so much as to venture on
enlisting you--by the sacrifice of the girl who now slumbers above--in
the cause whose end is the restoration of our fathers' gods, and in
whose service I have suffered and grown old? Listen, and you shall
hear from what I have fallen--you shall know what I once was!'
'I adjure you by all the gods and goddesses of our ancient worship, let
me hear you where I can breathe--in the garden, on the housetop,
anywhere but in this dungeon!' murmured the senator in entreating
accents.
'My birth, my parents, my education, my ancient abode--these I will not
disclose,' interrupted the Pagan, raising one arm authoritatively, as
if to obstruct Vetranio from approaching the door. 'I have sworn by my
gods, that until the day of restitution these secrets of my past life
shall remain unrevealed to strangers' ears. Unknown I entered Rome,
and unknown I will labour in Rome until the projects I have lived for
are crowned with success! It is enough that I confess to you that with
those sacred images whose fragments you have just beheld, I was once
lodged; that those sacred vestments whose remains you discerned at your
feet, I once wore. To attain the glories of the priesthood there was
nothing that I did not resign, to preserve them there was nothing I did
not perform, to recover them there is nothing that I will not attempt!
I was once illustrious, prosperous, beloved; of my glory, my happiness,
my popularity, the Christians have robbed me, and I will yet live to
requite it heavily at their hands! I had a guardian who loved me in my
youth; the Christians murdered him! A temple was under the rule of my
manhood; the Christians destroyed it! The people of a whole nation
once listened to my voice; the Christians have dispersed them! The
wise, the great, the beautiful, the good, were once devoted to me; the
Christians have made me a stranger at their doors, and outcast of their
affections and thoughts! For all this shall I take no vengeance? Shall
I not plot to rebuild my ruined temple, and win back, in my age, the
honours that adorned me in my youth?'
'Assuredly!--at once--without delay!' stammered Vetranio, returning the
stern and inquiring gaze of the Pagan with a bewildered, uneasy stare.
'To mount over the bodies of the Christian slain,' continued the old
man, his sinister eyes dilating in anticipated triumph as he whispered
close at the senator's ear, 'to rebuild the altars that the Christians
have overthrown, is the ambition that has made light to me the
sufferings of my whole life. I have battled, and it has sustained me
in the midst of carnage; I have wandered, and it has been my home in
the desert; I have failed, and it has supported me; I have been
threatened with death, and it has preserved me from fear; I have been
cast into slavery, and it has made my fetters light. You see me now,
old, degraded, lonely--believe that I long neither for wife, children,
tranquility, nor possessions; that I desire no companion but my
cherished and exalted purpose! Remember, then, in the hour of
performance the promise you have now made to aid me in the achievement
of that purpose! Remember that you are a Pagan yourself! Feast,
laugh, carouse with your compeers; be still the airy jester, the gay
companion; but never forget the end to which you are vowed--the destiny
of glory that the restoration of our deities has in store for us both!'
He ceased. Though his voice, while he spoke, never rose beyond a
hoarse, monotonous, half-whispering tone, all the ferocity of his
abused and degraded nature was for the instant thoroughly aroused by
his recapitulation of his wrongs. Had Vetranio at this moment shown
any symptoms of indecision, or spoken any words of discouragement, he
would have murdered him on the spot where they stood. Every feature in
the Pagan's seared and livid countenance expressed the stormy emotions
that were rushing over his heart as he now confronted his bewildered
yet attentive listener. His firm, menacing position; his poor and
scanty garments; his wild, shaggy hair; his crooked, distorted form;
his stern, solemn, unwavering gaze--opposed as they were (under the
fitful illumination of the expiring lamp and the advancing daylight) to
the unsteady gait, the vacant countenance, the rich robes, the youthful
grace of form and delicacy of feature of the object of his steady
contemplation, made so wild and strange a contrast between his
patrician ally and himself that they scarcely looked like beings of the
same race. Nothing could be more immense than the difference, more wild
than the incongruity between them. It was sickness hand-in-hand with
health; pain marshalled face to face with enjoyment; darkness ranged in
monstrous discordance by the very side of light.
The next instant--just as the astonished senator was endeavouring to
frame a suitable answer to the solemn adjuration that had been
addressed to him--Ulpius seized his arm, and opening a door at the
inner extremity of the apartment, led him up some stairs that conducted
to the interior of the house.
They passed the hall, on the floor of which still lay the fragments of
the broken lute, dimly distinguishable in the soft light of daybreak;
and ascending another staircase, paused at a little door at the top,
which Ulpius cautiously opened, and in a moment afterwards Vetranio was
admitted into Antonina's bed-chamber.
The room was of no great extent; its scanty furniture was of the most
ordinary description; no ornaments glittered on its walls; no frescoes
adorned its ceiling; and yet there was a simple elegance in its
appearance, an unobtrusive propriety in its minutest details, which
made it at once interesting and attractive to the eye. From the white
curtains at the window to the vase of flowers standing by the bedside,
the same natural refinement of taste appeared in the arrangement of all
that the apartment contained. No sound broke the deep silence of the
place, save the low, soft breathing, occasionally interrupted by a
long, trembling sigh, of its sleeping occupant. The sole light in the
room consisted of a little lamp, so placed in the middle of the flowers
round the sides of the vase that no extended or steady illumination was
cast upon any object. There was something in the decent propriety of
all that was visible in the bed-chamber; in the soft obscurity of its
atmosphere; in the gentle and musical sound that alone interrupted its
magical stillness, impressive enough, it might have been imagined, to
have awakened some hesitation in the bosom of the boldest libertine ere
he deliberately proceeded to intrude on the unprotected slumbers of its
occupant. No such feeling of indecision, however, troubled the
thoughts of Vetranio as he cast a rapid glance round the apartment
which he had ventured so treacherously to invade. The fumes of the
wine he had imbibed at the banquet had been so thoroughly resuscitated
by the oppressive atmosphere of the subterranean retreat he had just
quitted, as to have left him nothing of his more refined nature. All
that was honourable or intellectual in his character had now completely
ceded to all that was base and animal. He looked round, and perceiving
that Ulpius had silently quitted him, softly closed the door. Then
advancing to the bedside with the utmost caution compatible with the
involuntary unsteadiness of an intoxicated man, he took the lamp from
the vase in which it was half concealed, and earnestly surveyed by its
light the figure of the sleeping girl.
The head of Antonina was thrown back and rested rather over than on her
pillow. Her light linen dress had become so disordered during the
night that it displayed her throat and part of her bosom, in all the
dawning beauties of their youthful formation, to the gaze of the
licentious Roman. One hand half supported her head, and was almost
entirely hidden in the locks of her long black hair, which had escaped
from the white cincture intended to confine it, and now streamed over
the pillow in dazzling contrast to the light bed-furniture around it.
The other hand held tightly clasped to her bosom the precious fragment
of her broken lute. The deep repose expressed in her position had not
thoroughly communicated itself to her face. Now and then her slightly
parted lips moved and trembled, and ever and anon a change, so faint
and fugitive that it was hardly perceptible, appeared in her
complexion, breathing on the soft olive that was its natural hue, the
light rosy flush which the emotions of the past night had impressed on
it ere she slept. Her position, in its voluptuous negligence, seemed
the very type of Oriental loveliness; while her face, calm and
sorrowful in its expression, displayed the more refined and sober
graces of the European model. And thus these two characteristics of
two different orders of beauty, appearing conjointly under one form,
produced a whole so various and yet so harmonious, so impressive and
yet so attractive, that the senator, as he bent over the couch, though
the warm, soft breath of the young girl played on his cheeks and waved
the tips of his perfumed locks, could hardly imagine that the scene
before him was more than a bright, delusive dream.
While Vetranio was yet absorbed in admiration of her charms, Antonina's
form slightly moved, as if agitated by the influence of a passing
dream. The change thus accomplished in her position broke the spell
that its former stillness and beauty had unconsciously wrought to
restrain the unhallowed ardour of the profligate Roman. He now passed
his arm round her warm, slender figure, and gently raising her till her
head rested on his shoulder as he sat by the bed, imprinted kiss after
kiss on the pure lips that sleep had innocently abandoned to him.
As he had foreseen, Antonina instantly awoke, but, to his unmeasured
astonishment, neither started nor shrieked. The moment she had opened
her eyes she had recognised the person of Vetranio; and that
overwhelming terror which suspends in its victims the use of every
faculty, whether of the body or the mind, had immediately possessed
itself of her heart. Too innocent to imagine the real motive that
prompted the senator's intrusion on her slumbers, where others of her
sex would have foreboded dishonour, she feared death. All her father's
vague denunciations against the enormities of the nobles of Rome rushed
in an instant over her mind, and her childish imagination pictured
Vetranio as armed with some terrible and mysterious vengeance to be
wreaked on her for having avoided all communication with him as soon as
she had gained possession of her lute. Prostrate beneath the
petrifying influence of her fears, motionless and powerless before him
as its prey before the serpent, she made no effort to move or speak;
but looked up steadfastly into the senator's face, her large eyes fixed
and dilated in a gaze of overpowering terror.
Intoxicated though he was, the affrighted expression of the poor girl's
pale, rigid countenance did not escape Vetranio's notice; and he taxed
his bewildered brain for such soothing and reassuring expressions as
would enable him to introduce his profligate proposals with some chance
that they would be listened to and understood.
'Dearest pupil! Most beautiful of Roman maidens,' he began in the
husky, monotonous tones of inebriety, 'abandon your fears! I come
hither, wafted by the breath of love, to restore the worship of the--I
would say to bear you on my bosom to a villa--the name of which has for
the moment escaped my remembrance. You cannot have forgotten that it
was I who taught you to compose the Nightingale Sauce--or, no--let me
rather say to play upon the lute. Love, music, pleasure, all await you
in the arms of your attached Vetranio. Your eloquent silence speaks
encouragement to my heart. Beloved Anto--'
Here the senator suddenly paused; for the eyes of the girl, which had
hitherto been fixed on him with the same expression of blank dismay
that had characterised them from the first, slowly moved in the
direction of the door. The instant afterwards a slight noise caught
Vetranio's ear, and Antonina shuddered so violently as he pressed her
to his side that he felt it through his whole frame. Slowly and
unwillingly he withdrew his gaze from the pale yet lovely countenance
on which it had been fixed, and looked up.
At the open door, pale, silent, motionless, stood the master of the
house.
Incapable, from the confusion of his ideas, of any other feeling than
the animal instinct of self-defence, Vetranio no sooner beheld
Numerian's figure than he rose, and drawing a small dagger from his
bosom, attempted to advance on the intruder. He found himself,
however, restrained by Antonina, who had fallen on her knees before
him, and grasped his robe with a strength which seemed utterly
incompatible with the slenderness of her form and the feebleness of her
sex and age.
The first voice that broke the silence which ensued was Numerian's. He
advanced, his face ghastly with anguish, his lip quivering with
suppressed emotions, to the senator's side, and addressed him thus:--
'Put up your weapon; I come but to ask a favour at your hands.'
Vetranio mechanically obeyed him. There was something in the stern
calmness, frightful at such a moment, of the Christian's manner that
awed him in spite of himself.
'The favour I would petition for,' continued Numerian, in low, steady,
bitter tones, 'is that you would remove your harlot there, to your own
abode. Here are no singing-boys, no banqueting-halls, no perfumed
couches. The retreat of a solitary old man is no place for such an one
as she. I beseech you, remove her to a more congenial home. She is
well fitted for her trade; her mother was a harlot before her!'
He laughed scornfully, and pointed, as he spoke, to the figure of the
unhappy girl kneeling with outstretched arms at his feet.
'Father, father!' she cried, in accents bereft of their native softness
and melody, 'have you forgotten me?'
'I know you not!' he replied, thrusting her from him. 'Return to his
bosom; you shall never more be pressed to mine. Go to his palace; my
house is yours no longer! You are his harlot, not my daughter! I
command you--go!'
As he advanced towards her with fierce glance and threatening
demeanour, she suddenly rose up. Her reason seemed crushed within her
as she looked with frantic earnestness from Vetranio to her father, and
then back again from her father to Vetranio. On one side she saw an
enemy who had ruined her she knew not how, and who threatened her with
she knew not what; on the other, a parent who had cast her off. For
one instant she directed a final look on the room, that, sad and lonely
though it was, had still been a home to her; and then, without a word
or a sigh, she turned, and crouching like a beaten dog, fled from the
house.
During the whole of the scene Vetranio had stood so fixed in the
helpless astonishment of intoxication as to be incapable of moving or
uttering a word. All that took place during the short and terrible
interview between father and child utterly perplexed him. He heard no
loud, violent anger on one side, no clamorous petitioning for
forgiveness on the other. The stern old man whom Antonina had called
father, and who had been pointed out to him as the most austere
Christian in Rome, far from avenging his intrusion on Antonina's
slumber, had voluntarily abandoned his daughter to his licentious will.
That the anger or irony of so severe a man should inspire such an
action as this, or that Numerian, like his servant, was plotting to
obtain some strange mysterious favour from him by using Antonina as a
bribe, seemed perfectly impossible. All that passed before the senator
was, to his bewildered imagination, thoroughly incomprehensible.
Frivolous, thoughtless, profligate as he might be, his nature was not
radically base, and when the scene of which he had been the astounded
witness was abruptly terminated by the flight of Antonina, the look of
frantic misery fixed on him by the unfortunate girl at the moment of
her departure, almost sobered him for the instant, as he stood before
the now solitary father gazing vacantly around him with emotions of
uncontrollable confusion and dismay.
Meanwhile a third person was now approaching to join the two occupants
of the bedchamber abandoned by its ill-fated mistress. Although in the
subterranean retreat to which he had retired on leaving Vetranio,
Ulpius had not noticed the silent entrance of the master of the house,
he had heard through the open doors the sound, low though it was, of
the Christian's voice. As he rose, suspecting all things and prepared
for every emergency, to ascend to the bedchamber, he saw, while he
mounted the lowest range of stairs, a figure in white pass rapidly
through the hall and disappear by the principal entrance of the house.
He hesitated for an instant and looked after it, but the fugitive
figure had passed so swiftly in the uncertain light of early morning
that he was unable to identify it, and he determined to ascertain the
progress of events, now that Numerian must have discovered a portion at
least of the plot against his daughter and himself, by ascending
immediately to Antonina's apartment, whatever might be the consequences
of his intrusion at such an hour on her father's wrath.
As soon as the Pagan appeared before him, a sensible change took place
in Vetranio. The presence of Ulpius in the chamber was a positive
relief to the senator's perturbed faculties, after the mysterious,
overpowering influence that the moral command expressed in the mere
presence of the father and the master of the house, at such an hour,
had exercised over them. Over Ulpius he had an absolute right, Ulpius
was his dependant; and he determined, therefore, to extort from the
servant whom he despised an explanation of the mysteries in the conduct
of the master whom he feared, and the daughter whom he began to doubt.
'Where is Antonina?' he cried, starting as if from a trance, and
advancing fiercely towards the treacherous Pagan. 'She has left the
room--she must have taken refuge with you.'
With a slow and penetrating gaze Ulpius looked round the apartment. A
faint agitation was perceptible in his livid countenance, but he
uttered not a word.
The senator's face became pale and red with alternate emotions of
apprehension and rage. He seized the Pagan by the throat, his eyes
sparkled, his blood boiled, he began to suspect even then that Antonina
was lost to him for ever.
'I ask you again where is she?' he shouted in a voice of fury. 'If
through this night's work she is lost or harmed, I will revenge it on
you. Is this the performance of your promise? Do you think that I
will direct your desired restoration of the gods of old for this? If
evil comes to Antonina through your treachery, sooner than assist in
your secret projects, I would see you and your accursed deities all
burning together in the Christians' hell! Where is the girl, you
slave? Villain, where was your vigilance, when you let that man
surprise us at our first interview?'
He turned towards Numerian as he spoke. Trouble and emergency gift the
faculties with a more than mortal penetration. Every word that he had
uttered had eaten its burning way into the father's heart. Hours of
narrative could not have convinced him how fatally he had been
deceived, more thoroughly than the few hasty expressions he had just
heard. No word passed his lips--no action betrayed his misery. He
stood before the spoilers of his home, changed in an instant from the
courageous enthusiast to the feeble, helpless, heart-broken man.
Though all the ferocity of his old Roman blood had been roused in
Vetranio, as he threatened Ulpius, the father's look of cold, silent,
frightful despair froze it in his young veins in an instant. His heart
was still the impressible heart of youth; and, struck for the first
time in his life with emotions of horror and remorse, he advanced a
step to offer such explanation and atonement as he best might, when the
voice of Ulpius suspended his intentions, and made him pause to listen.
'She passed me in the hall,' muttered the Pagan, doggedly. 'I did my
part in betraying her into your power--it was for you to hinder her in
her flight. Why did you not strike him to the earth,' he continued,
pointing with a mocking smile to Numerian, 'when he surprised you? You
are wealthy and a noble of Rome; murder would have been no crime in
you!'
'Stand back!' cried the senator, thrusting him from the position he had
hitherto occupied in the door-way. 'She may be recovered even yet!
All Rome shall be searched for her!'
The next instant he disappeared from the room, and the master and
servant were left together alone.
The silence that now reigned in the apartment was broken by distant
sounds of uproar and confusion in the streets of the city beneath.
These ominous noises had arisen with the dawn of day, but the different
emotions of the occupants of Numerian's abode had so engrossed them,
that the turmoil in the outer world had passed unheeded by all. No
sooner, however, had Vetranio departed than it caught the attention of
Ulpius, and he advanced to the window. What he there saw and heard was
of no ordinary importance, for it at once fixed him to the spot where
he stood in mute and ungovernable surprise.
While Ulpius was occupied at the window, Numerian had staggered to the
side of the bed which his ill-timed severity had made vacant, perhaps
for ever. The power of action, the capacity to go forth and seek his
child himself, was entirely suspended in the agony of her loss, as the
miserable man fell on his knees, and in the anguish of his heart
endeavoured to find solace in prayer. In the positions they severally
occupied the servant and the master long remained--the betrayer
watching at the window, the betrayed mourning at his lost daughter's
bed--both alike silent, both alike unconscious of the lapse of time.
At length, apparently unaware at first that he was not alone in the
room, Numerian spoke. In his low, broken, tremulous accents, none of
his adherents would have recognised the voice of the eloquent
preacher--the bold chastiser of the vices of the Church. The whole
nature of the man--moral, intellectual, physical--seemed fatally and
completely changed.
'She was innocent, she was innocent!' he whispered to himself. 'And
even had she been guilty, was it for me to drive her from my doors! My
part, like my Redeemer's, was to teach repentance, and to show mercy!
Accursed be the pride and anger that drove justice and patience from my
heart, when I beheld her, as I thought, submitting herself without a
struggle or a cry, to my dishonour, and hers! Could I not have
imagined her terror, could I not have remembered her purity? Alas, my
beloved, if I myself have been the dupe of the wicked, what marvel is
it that you should have been betrayed as well! And I have driven you
from me, you, from whose mouth no word of anger ever dropped! I have
thrust you from my bosom, you, who were the adornment of my age! My
death approaches, and you will not be by to pardon my heavy offence, to
close my weary eyes, to mourn by my solitary tomb! God--oh God! If I
am left thus lonely on the earth, thou hast punished me beyond what I
can bear!'
He paused--his emotions for the instant bereft him of speech. After an
interval, he muttered to himself in a low, moaning voice--'I called her
harlot! My pure, innocent child! I called her harlot--I called her
harlot!'
In a paroxysm of despair, he started up and looked distractedly around
him. Ulpius still stood motionless at the window. At the sight of the
ruthless Pagan he trembled in every limb. All those infirmities of age
that had been hitherto spared him, seemed to overwhelm him in an
instant. He feebly advanced to his betrayer's side, and addressed him
thus:--
'I have lodged you, taught you, cared for you; I have never intruded on
your secrets, never doubted your word, and for all this, you have
repaid me by plotting against my daughter and deceiving me! If your
end was to harm me by assailing my child's happiness and honour you
have succeeded! If you would banish me from Rome, if you would plunge
me into obscurity, to serve some mysterious ambition of your own, you
may dispose of me as you will! I bow before the terrible power of your
treachery! I will renounce whatever you command, if you will restore
me to my child! I am helpless and miserable; I have neither heart nor
strength to seek her myself! You, who know all things and can dare all
dangers, may restore her to pardon and bless me, if you will!
Remember, whoever you really are, that you were once helpless and
alone, and that you are still old, like me! Remember that I have
promised to abandon to you whatever you desire! Remember that no
woman's voice can cheer me, no woman's heart feel for me, now that I am
old and lonely, but my daughter's! I have guessed from the words of
the nobleman whom you serve, what are the designs you cherish and the
faith you profess; I will neither betray the one nor assault the other!
I thought that my labours for the Church were more to me than anything
on earth, but now, that through my fault, my daughter is driven from
her father's roof, I know that she is dearer to me than the greatest of
my designs; I must gain her pardon; I must win back her affection
before I die! You are powerful and can recover her! Ulpius! Ulpius!'
As he spoke, the Christian knelt at the Pagan's feet. It was terrible
to see the man of affection and integrity thus humbled before the man
of heartlessness and crime.
Ulpius turned to behold him, then without a word he raised him from the
ground, and thrusting him to the window, pointed with flashing eyes to
the wide view without.
The sun had arisen high in the heaven and beamed in dazzling brilliancy
over Rome and the suburbs. A vague, fearful, mysterious desolation
seemed to have suddenly overwhelmed the whole range of dwellings beyond
the walls. No sounds rose from the gardens, no population idled in the
streets. The ramparts on the other hand were crowded at every visible
point with people of all ranks, and the distant squares and
amphitheatres of the city itself, swarmed like ant-hills to the eye
with the crowds that struggled within them. Confused cries and strange
wild noises rose at all points from these masses of human beings. The
whole of Rome seemed the prey of a vast and universal revolt.
Extraordinary and affrighting as was the scene at the moment when he
beheld it, it passed unheeded before the eyes of the scarce conscious
father. He was blind to all sights but his daughter's form, deaf to
all sounds but her voice; and he murmured as he looked vacantly forth
upon the wild view before him, 'Where is my child!--where is my child!'
'What is your child to me? What are the fortunes of affections of man
or woman, at such an hour as this?' cried the Pagan, as he stood by
Numerian, with features horribly animated by the emotions of fierce
delight and triumph that were raging within him at the prospect he
beheld. 'Dotard, look from this window! Listen to those voices! The
gods whom I serve, the god whom you and your worship would fain have
destroyed, have risen to avenge themselves at last! Behold those
suburbs, they are left desolate! Hear those cries--they are from Roman
lips! While your household's puny troubles have run their course, this
city of apostates has been doomed! In the world's annals this morning
will never be forgotten! THE GOTHS ARE AT THE GATES OF ROME!'