The Roman Traitor Volume Ii Part 2

An hour perhaps had pa.s.sed, when the door was again opened, and the aged plebeian, Icilia's father, issued into the dark street.

"Scourged!" he cried, with a wild triumphant laugh, "Scourged, like a slave, at his own father's bidding! Rejoice, exult, Icilia! thy shame is half avenged!"

CHAPTER II.

THE CONSULAR COMITIA.

Your voices!

CORIOLa.n.u.s.

The morning had at length arrived, big with the fate of Rome. The morning of the Consular elections.

The sun shone broad and bright over the gorgeous city, and the wide green expanse of the field of Mars, whereon, from an hour before the first peep of dawn, the mighty mult.i.tude of Roman citizens had stood a.s.sembled.

All the formalities had been performed successfully. The Consul Cicero, who had gone forth beyond the walls to take the auspices, accompanied by an augur, had declared the auguries favorable.

The separate enclosures, with the bridges, as they were termed, across which the centuries must pa.s.s to give their votes, had been erected; the distributors of the ballots, and the guardians of the ballot-boxes, had been appointed.

And now, as the sun rushed up with his crown of living glory into the cloudless arch of heaven, the brazen trumpets of the centuries pealed long and loud, calling the civic army to its ranks, in order to commence their voting.

That was the awful moment; and scarce a breast was there, but beat high with hope or fear, or dark and vague antic.i.p.ation.

The Consul and the friends of order were, perhaps, calmer and more confident, than any others of that mighty concourse; for they were satisfied with their preparations; they were firm in the support of the patrician houses, and in the unanimity of the Roman knights conciliated by Cicero.

Scarcely less confident were the conspirators; for with so much secrecy had the arrangements of the Consul been made, that although Catiline knew himself suspected, knew that his motives were perspicuous, and his measures in some sort antic.i.p.ated, he yet believed that the time was propitious.

He hoped, and believed as fully as he hoped, that Cicero and his party, content with the triumph they had obtained in the Senate, and with the adjudication by that body of dictatorial power to the consuls, were now deceived into the idea that the danger was already over.

Still, his fierce heart throbbed violently; and there was a feeling of hot agonizing doubt blent with the truculent hope, the savage ambition, the strong thirst of blood, which goaded him almost to madness.

From an early hour he had stood surrounded by his friends, the leaders of that awful faction, hard by the portico of the _diribitorium_, or pay-office, marking with a keen eye every group that entered the field of Mars, and addressing those, whom he knew friendly to his measures, with many a fiery word of greeting and encouragement.

Ca.s.sius and Lentulus, a little way behind him, leaned against the columns of the gateway, with more than a thousand of the clients of their houses lounging about in groups, seemingly inattentive, but really alive to every word or glance of their leaders.

These men were all armed secretly with breast plates, and the puissant Roman sword, beneath their peaceful togas.

These men, well-trained in the wars of Sylla, hardy and brave, and acting in a body, were destined to commence the work of slaughter, by slaying the Great Consul, so soon as he should open the comitia.

Cethegus had departed, already, to join his gladiators, who, to the number of fifteen hundred, were gathered beyond the Janiculum, ready to act upon the guard, and to beat down the standard which waved there, the signal of election.

Statilius, Gabinius, and Caeparius, were ready with their armed households and insurgent slaves, prepared at a moment's notice to throw open the prison doors, and fire the city in twelve places.

Fearless, unanimous, armed, and athirst for blood, the foes of the republic stood, and marked with greedy eyes and visages inflamed and fiery, their victims sweep through the gates, arrayed in their peaceful robes, unarmed, as it would seem, and unsuspecting.

Not a guard was to be seen anywhere; not a symptom of suspicion; much less of preparation. The wonted cohort only was gathered about the standard on the bridge gate of the Janiculum; but even these bore neither shields, nor javelins; and sat or lounged about, unconcerned, and evidently off their guard.

But the keen eye of Catiline, could mark the band of grey-tunicked Gladiators, mustered, and ready to a.s.sume the offensive at a moment's notice, though now they were sauntering about, or sitting down or lying in the shade, or chatting with the country girls and rustic slaves, who covered the sloping hill-sides of the Janiculum, commanding a full view of the Campus Martius.

"The Fools!" muttered Catiline. "The miserable, G.o.d-deserted idiots! Does the man of Arpinum deem me then so weak, to be disarmed by an edict, quelled by a paltry proclamation?"

Then, as the stout smith, Caius Crispus, pa.s.sed by him, with a gang of workmen, and a rabble of the lowest citizens,

"Ha!" he exclaimed, "hail, Crispus-hail, brave hearts!-all things look well for us to-day-well for the people! Your voices, friends; I must have your voices!"

"You shall-Catiline!" replied the smith-"and our hands also!" he added, with a significant smile and a dark glance.

"Catiline! Catiline-all friends of the good people, all foes of the proud patricians, give n.o.ble Catiline your voices!"

"Catiline! Catiline for the persecuted people!" and, with a wild and stirring shout, the mob pa.s.sed inward through the gate, leaving the smith behind, however; who stopped as if to speak with one of the Cornelian clients, but in reality to wait further orders.

"When shall we march"-he asked, after a moment or two, stealthily approaching the chief conspirator. "Before they have called the prerogative century to vote, or when the knights are in the bridges?"

"When the standard goes down, fool!" replied Catiline, harshly. "Do not you know your work?"

At this moment, a party of young and dissipated n.o.bles came swaggering along the road, with their ungirded tunics flowing down to their heels, their long sleeves fringed with purple falling as far as to their wrists, and their curled ringlets floating on their shoulders. Among them, with a bloodshot eye, a pale and haggard face, and a strange terrible expression, half-sullen, half-ashamed, on all his features, as if he fancied that his last night's disgrace was known to all men, strode Aulus Fulvius, the son of that stern senator.

"Your voices! n.o.blemen, your voices!" cried Catiline, laughing with feigned gayety-"Do but your work to-day, and to-night"-

"Wine and fair women!" shouted one; but Aulus smiled savagely, and darkly, and answered in one word "Revenge!"

Next behind them, came Ba.s.sus, the veteran father of the dead eagle-bearer; he who had told so sad a tale of patrician cruelty to Fulvius Flaccus, in the forge.

"Why, Ba.s.sus, my brave veteran, give me your hand," cried the conspirator, making a forward step to meet him. "For whom vote you to-day, for Murna and Sila.n.u.s? Ha?"

"For Catiline and justice!" answered the old man, "justice on him who wronged the Eagle-bearer's child! who sits in the senate even yet, defiled with her pure blood!-the infamous Cornelius!"

Another man had paused to listen to these words, and he now interposed, speaking to Ba.s.sus,

"Verily Catiline is like to do thee justice, my poor Ba.s.sus, on a member of the Cornelian house! Is't Lentulus, I prithee, or Cethegus, on whom thou would'st have justice?"

But the old man replied angrily, "The people's friend shall give the people justice! who ever knew a n.o.ble pity or right a poor man?"

"Ask Aulus Fulvius"-replied the other, with a sarcastic tone, and a strange smile lighting up his features. "Besides, is not Catiline a n.o.ble?"

At the word Aulus Fulvius leaped on him like a tiger, with his face crimsoning, and his heart almost bursting with fury.

He could not speak for rage, but he seized the man who had uttered those mysterious words by the throat, and brandished a long poniard, extricated in a second's s.p.a.ce from the loose sleeve of his tunic, furiously in the air.

As the bright blade flashed in the sunlight, there was a forward rush among the conspirators, who, anxious to avert any casual affray, that might have created a disturbance, would have checked the blow.

But their aid would have come too late, had not the man thus suddenly a.s.saulted, by an extraordinary exertion of strength, vigor, and agility, wrenched the dagger from Aulus' hand, and, tripping him at the same moment with his foot, hurled him upon his back in the dust, which surged up in a great cloud, covering his perfumed hair and snow-white toga, with its filthy and faetid particles.