The Roman Traitor Volume I Part 9

"The gray, the gray! There is not a horse in Rome can touch Aurelius Victor's gray South-wind!" replied the other.

And in truth, Victor's Gallic courser repaid his master's vaunts; for he made, though he had seemed beat, so desperate a rally, that he rushed past the bay Arab almost at the goal, and won by a clear length amidst the roars of the glad spectators.

"I have lost, plague on it!" exclaimed Catiline; "and here is Clodius expects to be paid on the instant, I'll be sworn."

And as he spoke, the debauchee with whom he had betted came up, holding his left hand extended, tapping its palm with the forefinger of the right.

"I told you so," he said, "I told you so; where be the sesterces?"

"You must needs wait a while; I have not my purse with me," Catiline began. But Paullus interrupted him-

"I have, I have, my Sergius; permit me to accommodate you." And suiting the action to the word, he gave the conspirator several large gold coins, adding, "you can repay me when it suits you."

"That will be never," said Clodius with a sneer; "you don't know Lucius Catiline, I see, young man."

"Ay, but he does!" replied the other, with a sarcastic grin; "for Catiline never forgets a friend, or forgives a foe. Can Clodius say the same?"

But Clodius merely smiled, and walked off, clinking the money he had won tauntingly in his hand.

"What now, I wonder, is the day destined to bring forth?" said the conspirator, making no more allusion to the dagger.

"A contest now between myself, Aristius, and Aurelius, in the five games of the _quinquertium_, and then a foot race in the heaviest panoply."

"Ha! can you beat them?" asked Catiline, regarding Arvina with an interest that grew every moment keener, as he saw more of his strength and daring spirit.

"I can try."

"Shall I bet on you?"

"If you please. I can beat them in some, I think; and, as I said, I will try in all."

More words followed, for Paullus hastened away to strip and anoint himself for the coming struggle; and in a little while the strife itself succeeded.

To describe this would be tedious; but suffice it, that while he won decidedly three games of the five, Paullus was beat in none; and that in the armed foot race, the most toilsome and arduous exercise of the Campus, he not only beat his compet.i.tors with ease; but ran the longest course, carrying the most ponderous armature and shield, in shorter time than had been performed within many years on the Field of Mars.

Catiline watched him eagerly all the while, inspecting him as a purchaser would a horse he was about to buy; and then, muttering to himself, "We must have him!" walked up to join him as he finished the last exploit.

"Will you dine with me, Paullus," he said, "to-day, and meet the loveliest women you can see in Rome, and no prudes either?"

"Willingly," he replied; "but I must swim first in the Tiber!"

"Be it so, there is time enough; I will swim also." And they moved down in company toward the river.

CHAPTER VI.

THE FALSE LOVE.

Fie, fie, upon her; There's a language in her eye, her cheek, her lip; Nay, her foot speaks, her wanton spirits look out At every joint and motive of her body.

TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.

About three hours later than the scene in the Campus Martius, which had occurred a little after noon, Catiline was standing richly dressed in a bright saffron(13) robe, something longer than the ordinary tunic, flowered with sprigs of purple, in the inmost chamber of the woman's apartments, in his own heavily mortgaged mansion. His wife, Aurelia Orestilla, sat beside him on a low stool, a woman of the most superb and queenly beauty-for whom it was believed that he had plunged himself into the deepest guilt-and still, although past the prime of Italian womanhood, possessing charms that might well account for the most insane pa.s.sion.

A slave was listening with watchful and half terrified attention to the injunctions of his lord-for Catiline was an unscrupulous and severe master-and, as he ceased speaking, he made a deep genuflexion and retired.

No sooner had he gone than Catiline turned quickly to the lady, whose lovely face wore some marks of displeasure, and said rather shortly,

"You have not gone to her, my Aurelia. There is no time to lose; the young man will be here soon, and if they meet, ere you have given her the cue, all will be lost."

"I do not like it, my Sergius," said the woman, rising, but making no movement to leave the chamber.

"And why not, I beseech you, madam?" he replied angrily; "or what is there in that which I desire you to tell the girl to do, that you have not done twenty times yourself, and Fulvia, and Semp.r.o.nia, and half Rome's n.o.blest ladies? Tush! I say, tush! go do it."

"She is my daughter, Sergius," answered Aurelia, in a tone of deep tenderness; "a daughter's honor must be something to every mother!"

"And a son's life to every father!" said Catiline with a fierce sneer. "I had a son once, I remember. You wished to enter an (14)_empty_ house on the day of your marriage feast. I do not think you found him in your way!

Besides, for honor-if I read Lucia's eyes rightly, there is not much of that to emperil."

When he spoke of his son, she covered her face in her richly jewelled hands, and a slight shudder shook her whole frame. When she looked up again, she was pale as death, and her lips quivered as she asked-

"Must I, then? Oh! be merciful, my Sergius."

"You must, Aurelia!" he replied sternly, "and that now. Our fortunes, nay, our lives, depend on it!"

"_All_-must she give all, Lucius?"

"All that he asks! But fear not, he shall wed her, when our plans shall be crowned with triumph!"

"Will you swear it?"

"By all the G.o.ds! he shall! by all the Furies, if you will, by Earth, and Heaven, and Hades!"

"I will go," she replied, something rea.s.sured, "and prepare her for the task!"

"The task!" he muttered with his habitual sneer. "Daintily worded, fair one; but it will not, I fancy, prove a hard one; Paullus is young and handsome; and our soft Lucia has, methinks, something of her mother's yielding tenderness."

"Do you reproach me with it, Sergius?"

"Nay! rather I adore thee for it, loveliest one; but go and prepare our Lucia." Then, as she left the room, the dark scowl settled down on his black brow, and he clinched his hand as he said-

"She waxes stubborn-let her beware! She is not half so young as she was; and her beauty wanes as fast as my pa.s.sion for it; let her beware how she crosses me!"

While he was speaking yet a slave entered, and announced that Paullus Caecilius Arvina had arrived, and Curius, and the n.o.ble Fulvia; and as he received the tidings the frown pa.s.sed away from the brow of the conspirator, and putting on his mask of smooth, smiling dissimulation, he went forth to meet his guests.