the emperor, acting in his capacity as pontifex maximus, had confirmed as virgin priestess of vesta, flavia, a child of ten, daughter of valerian and valeria. to celebrate the event valerian gave the people games. held in the new amphitheatre, the spectacle drew all rome. the emperor honoured the donor by his presence. gladiators contended, after strange fashions, with beasts of the wood and the plain and with one another. valerian, a successful general, lately returned from the west, had brought prisoners, great flaxen-headed men, who now fought, divided into two bands, kin against kin, with freedom the prize for the surviving.
the amphitheatre was huge, one oval, hollow wave of men and women. the people came early, struggling for good seats, desirous of being on hand for every important entrance,—the emperor, the senators, the prefect of the city, the vestals, the donors of the games, the famed, the rich, the knowing. down streamed the sun, hot and bare upon the arena, broken elsewhere by awnings of rose and blue. flowers withered in garlands, perfumes were burning in silver braziers. a sea of sound steadfastly beat against the ear, a vast blend of voices, male and female, of every quality. vigiles kept order. in the arena, in the sloping passways between the divisions of the benches, jugglers and buffoons and pantomimists kept the many amused until there should arrive the glittering few. fruit and a kind of{239} comfit were carried about and distributed. the people acclaimed valerian the generous.
the freedwoman lais picked a great bunch of grapes for herself, and another for her daughter iras, a child a year or so older than the little new vestal. “valeria has a marble chair while i have a stone bench,” quoth lais. “but she can eat no better grapes than these! moreover, she has kissed her girl for the last time to-day, while i can kiss mine any day! still the gods keep planting thistles with roses!”
“mother, mother!” whispered iras. “is it over there that father will sit?”
“hush, and eat your grapes!” answered lais.
the oceanic voice of the place deepened to a roar. the great were coming. the buffoons, jugglers, pantomimists, passers to and fro stood still. up and down the dizzy slopes the mass scrambled to its feet. “hail, c?sar! hail, c?sar!”
with pomp came the emperor, pr?torians, and civic officers; with pomp came the six vestals, the virgo vestalis maxima and her five sister priestesses, splendidly attended. the six were robed in white, stola and pallium, their hair bound with ribands of white wool. they took the seats of the vestals, over against the emperor. with them, to-day, came the newly chosen young vestal, the child of ten, daughter of valerian and valeria. she was dressed like the older priestesses, but her hair had been cut upon her taking the vows. she had an especial place; she sat stiffly, in view of all, a little figure all in white, with folded hands. her vows were for thirty years. for ten of these she would be trained in the service of vesta, for ten she would watch the sacred fire, bring the sacred water, offer the sacrifices{240} of salt cakes, the libations of wine and oil, pray for the roman state, guard the palladium; for ten she would teach the youthful vestals. she would have enormous honour, great privileges.
the freedwoman and her daughter, leaning forward in their places, whispering each to the other, watched the child in white. “see the people look at her! are the games for flavia?” asked the child iras, and she spoke with a child’s jealousy.
“eat thy grapes, my poor babe! thou wilt not have a great house and riches and honour like the vestals!” lais gave her rich, chuckling laugh. “neither, if thou lettest the fire go out at home, shalt thou be cruelly scourged! nor, when thou art older, if thou slippest once—just once—just one little time—shalt thou be buried alive!”
the little, new vestal sat still, with her hands crossed before her. her eyes filled with tears, they rolled down her cheeks. the attendants having her in charge whispered to her hastily. she must not weep! “then turn me so that i cannot see my mother.”
valerian with valeria his wife had bowed before the emperor. now they sat quietly, with a studied lack of state, as was fitting, about them friends of the soberer sort. valerian talked with the stoic paulinus. valeria sat still as a figure of ivory and gold, her long-fingered hands clasped in her lap, her eyes upon the garlanded place of the vestals, upon the little figure sitting so stiffly.... down in the arena they were making ready, and in the meantime five hundred dancing fauns and nymphs gave entertainment.
not till there began the struggle between man and beast and man and man would tense interest stop the voice of the{241} host. up and down the sound was as of the sea, or of a high wind in those endless barbarian forests on the edge of empire where valerian had been. behind the freedwoman and her child crowded market men and women, provincials of low estate, half a dozen soldiers. of these last it appeared that valerian had been general. their general figured in their talk, and they did not scant their praise. they called him brave and wary, good father to his cohorts. a provincial asked about the children of his body. lais turned a little toward the speakers.—“all but this one died. he adopted a son so that his name should last—see, the young man standing up! but he has no own children save the little vestal.”
lais, with a jerk of her head, went back to eating grapes and contemplating the fauns and nymphs.
“no lawful children, you mean?” said the provincial.
“of course,” answered the soldier: “owned children. there are owned children and there are unowned children.—ha! watch them leap and dance!”
lais ate the purple grapes, spitting out the seeds. iras, leaning forward, watched the wreathing fauns and nymphs. “mother, mother! when i am grown i will be a dancer!”
“who is the old man talking to the general?”
“paulinus the stoic.—once valerian thought no more of his soul than another—”
“ha! we begin!”
the five hundred dancing nymphs and fauns swirled from the arena like wind-blown coloured leaves and petals. a grating slid back, there came forth a hollow roar. forth upon the sand walked a lion from africa, a king among lions. another gate opened; there stepped forth, naked, a{242} yellow-headed giant. the games began.... presently there were many beasts and many men.
valeria sat with her hands in her lap, and for a long time had no thought save for the child that was going from her. her will had bowed to that going. it was a great and honourable destiny, and many competed for the nomination for their daughters. flavia did not pass from life. she, valeria, would hear of her, see her, might visit her in the great, rich house of the vestals. but the mother grieved that she would not see her every day, would no more lie beside her nor bear her in her arms. she was so sunken in the thought of the little one that she gave scant attention to the place in which she was, to the sloping wilderness where men and women took the place of trees, and down below, as in a vast pit, men fought with and like the beasts of the wood. upon the slopes held breathlessness, a leaning forward and down as though bent by a wind. down in the arena held heavy breathing, straining, bestial sounds of struggle, shouts, groans, cries of triumph and despair.... flavia stepped aside in her mind. out of mind went the other vestals, the emperor, all the great, and the massed people; aside stepped also valerian. she had been to the games before, but she had not before felt woe and sadness like this. her soul plunged into black depths, then rose. for the first time she hated the games; she found them smeared with guilt. it seemed to her that veils parted; she caught wider glimpses of life and its ways. how long she had lived, and how bent and crooked, here starved and here swollen, was living! these hateful games—c?sar’s empurpled face—the multitude craving and lusting for the red, the loud, the suffering of another.... she felt for all a sick distaste. she wished to rise and go away, flavia{243} in her arms and beside her valerian.... she went farther. faint as first dawn in an old deep forest she experienced a sense of oneness with all within the range of perception, with the breathless tiers, with the panting, the groaning arena. very faintly, she would have had all rise and go away, very faintly the whole rose and moved with her. but it was only like a breath of dawn; in a moment she thought again only of flavia and valerian. but it had been, and might be again. down in the pit a man, struggling with a brute, gave a short cry of agony. a man and a woman, near her, leaning from marble seats, showed gloating faces, drew in their breath with a sound of delight. she felt again the wave of pain, resistance, the effort to lift and remove, the straining as against grave-clothes.
the day, short to the most but long and long to many, drew to an end. the huge spectacle given by valerian closed with a final clanging feat, red colour and uproar. forth went the emperor, forth the vestals, forth the prefect, senators, knights, the pr?torians, the huge people. the amphitheatre emptied by many ways, but without, in the columned space that fronted it, all orders blended. patrician and plebeian pressed each against the other. in the seething colour and sound, valerian and valeria, with them many friends, came against a great knot and concourse of market-people. at cross-directions there occurred a momentary halting. the folk, recognizing valerian, shouted his name. he, as donor of the show, must continue to exhibit good-will. what he showed he felt. he had been long in savage forests; returning, he felt rome and the romans warm about his heart. he greeted the folk as they greeted him, laughter and good words passed between them. then lais, the freedwoman, the{244} flower-seller, pushed herself, or was pushed, toward the front. she had in her hand iras her daughter. together they came as fully as might be before valerian and valeria. now iras was a beautiful child. valerian looked on lais whom he remembered, but valeria looked at iras. “hail, general!” chanted the flower-seller, and with deliberation pushed before her the child. “hail, general! did you see any fairer, out there among barbarians?”
if valerian had or had not did not appear, for now others came between. in especial young men came, roisterers from the palatine. these pushed against the market-folk, and one, curled and garlanded, threw his arms around lais, who yet possessed beauty. when she released herself, valerian and valeria and their following had passed by.
that night was feasting in valerian’s house in rome. the next day was business in c?sar’s house and elsewhere. the third day he went with valeria to his country house in the alban hills.
at sunset the two paced the terrace, all the air sweet with flowers, spread beneath them the wide, darkling plain. they had not been alone together since the day of the games. now they walked up and down in silence, husband and wife, in much understanding each the other, yet in much each to the other barbarian, loving much, yet at not a few points drawn widely apart. outwardly, they were at rich, first prime, and both of them fair to the eye.
the west was crimson, their vineyards and olive trees caught the last bright light, white doves fluttered about a dovecote and walked the terrace with them.
valerian drew deep breath. “how sweet it is to be at home!... who first thought of home deserves well!{245}”
“it is sweet.... valerian, the captives, the miserable in the arena the other day! a kind of captivity and misery to be the watchers....”
“have you felt that? i have felt it too. but not one man nor many men can change the world.... a man would be torn to pieces who said to the people, ‘the games are done with, things of the past!’”
“yes.... ill customs perhaps ignorantly begun, and we go on because we have gone on so long.... yet are we never to end ill, begin better?”
“in the long, long run, perhaps, yes.... i suppose we all sleep, or are poisoned.... however, i said to myself, there in the amphitheatre, ‘when needs must, i will go to these games, but not for pleasure. but not again, though i become thrice as rich as i am, shall i furnish them!’”
“i am glad of that.—see flavia’s grey dove in the almond tree!”
they watched the dove. it rose, showed dark against the carmine sky, then passed into the black depths of a cypress.
“cease now to mourn for flavia,” said valerian. “she will be happy.”
“perhaps.... men love children, i know, but hardly as women love them.”
“nature allows that. but a man may do wisely by his children.”
“oh, ofttimes!—and ofttimes unwisely! but whatever and however he does they lie in his hand. utterly, utterly they lie in his hand! he makes all the laws for them. he puts them to death when he wills. o earth! the mother is in his hand and the child is in his hand, and we bow our heads and worship where he bids!{246}”
“what ails thee, valeria? do not i, valerian, love thee and love flavia?”
“yes, valerian, yes!”
“then—”
“there is much cause for wonder in this world.... how did it ever come that men made men fight with beasts upon the sands of an arena for show? how did it ever come that men have over women the whole power of law and the state? oh, i answer myself! it came in many ways, here a little and there a little—”
“nature and the gods—”
“valerian, do you believe that?”
“yes, i believe it.”
“it flatters your pride to believe it, and so you believe!... but i say, too, that women must have erred and erred.... both you and i stray in a vast wood!”
“rome and the parting with the child have fevered you.... but you were always subtle and thinking, thinking—”
“look how the light sprinkles the plain!—here is faustus.”
a grey-headed man leaning upon a staff came to meet them. it was faustus the philosopher to whom valerian gave house-room.
“hail, valerian and valeria! good is the city, but good indeed is the country! how beautiful are the olive trees and the sea of gold!”
they paced the terrace up and down, by the marble statues and the flowering trees. “faustus, i have read that zeno said, ‘all men are by nature equal. in degree of virtue alone are they different.’”
“he said so, valeria. and so do all stoics, his followers.{247}”
“and slaves and captives and strangers—”
“they also. underneath and above they are one with the master and the victor and the roman.”
“and women—and women, faustus?”
faustus leaned upon his staff. “they also, valeria.”
valerian made a movement of impatience. “o faustus, where is that last said?”
“it follows, valerian.”
“it is theory! it has never been, nor will it ever be. as we cannot free the slaves, so women cannot walk equal with men. but goodness to slaves, goodness and love to women i grant!”
faustus was silent.
said valeria, “that is much to grant, but not enough.”
they were standing beneath a high-raised marble figure of ceres. valerian struck with his hand the base of the statue. his brow darkened. “o, valeria, you and i have struggled together before now—struggled long, struggled hard! now we are at peace. i value peace. let us stay there!”
“you make a slavery and call it peace!”
he stamped with his foot. “let it be! let it be!”
the wife raised her arms to the skies, then let them drop. she could sing most sweetly. now, suddenly, she broke into song, a wild folk-carol of sun and earth and gods and d?mons. she sang a charmed silence upon the terrace and the garden below. tree, vine, and flower, bird upon the bough, light in the west, seemed to dream, listening. faustus sat upon a bench, his hands crossed over his staff, his eyes upon the brightening evening star. valerian sighed. he leaned against the wall and shadowed his face with his hand, and the inward light beat against the{248} inward eye, but the eye was not yet strengthened enough to receive it strongly. the woman ceased to sing, the dusk thickened, the dank and chill of the evening were felt, they went into the house.
later, in the great chamber, the house master and mistress being alone for the night, valeria standing trimming the lamp that burned, fed by perfumed oil, before the little figures of the household deities, said suddenly, “she was your child—that lovely brown-haired one a woman thrust before us, leaving the amphitheatre. she was so like you!—more like than is flavia.”
valerian came and stood beside her. “the woman was lais the greek. five years since i freed her, and bought for her a flower shop. then we became as strangers. thou knowest that illness i had, five years ago, and how, recovering, i changed much in my life.... the freedwoman has her shop of flowers, and if i remember her aright will be ever warm and kind to the child.”
“what is her name—the child’s?”
“her name?... i cannot,” said valerian, “remember it.”
from the rhine, from post to post, along the roman roads, came with swiftness tidings that again the marcomanni had risen in revolt. back to his legion, encamped upon that river, hastened valerian. arrived, he made junction with an endangered legion stationed inland, and drove with twin eagles against the marcomanni. these broke, these fled; a host was slain, a host taken. the brand of revolt, dashed against earth, had its fire put out. the auxiliaries who brought to rome, over hundreds of leagues, over roman roads, to slavery, to the games of the amphi{249}theatre, the huge many of prisoners, brought also praise of valerian. the victory praised him, the safety of the legions praised him. the emperor nodded, looked aslant, made the sign that kept away evil. said one under his breath to another in the house of c?sar, “do not win too much nor be liked too well, for that is the road to the mamertine!”
valerian, far from rome and that savour of incense and look of danger, obeyed soldierly duty and something higher. revolt subdued, he conciliated, organized, administered, and all was done well. it took time. months rolled away in the northern forests, by the northern streams. the months became a year, the year two years, the two three. valerian wrote to rome, asking permission to return for a while to family and estate. permission was denied. he had thought that it would be so, for letters told him that ever more and more c?sar hated other men’s successes, and that, besides, certain foes of his worked against him in rome. upon the heels of that denial came an order to proceed to the command of a legion in britain. that was to leave a famous legion for one not so famed. that was to leave captain and soldiers who engaged for victory wheresoever he led for others who knew him not. it was to leave a region that he knew for obscure struggles with the caledonians at the edge of the world. valerian sat with his chin in his hand, and pondered his own revolt—his own and the famed legion, drawing with it other legions. he shook his head; he consulted loyalty and the public good. obeying the imperial word, he set his face to the west, he travelled long and far, and crossed the narrow sea and came to britain and travelled the roman road to the legion in the north. here he stayed two years and did well, so well that at the end of that time he was sent to command not a{250} legion, but auxiliary troops in a poor and drowsy corner of the empire where opportunity might be expected never to show her face. expectation was disappointed; in the third year opportunity appeared with suddenness. valerian took her by both hands. his name once more became sonorous. when he had been almost ten years from rome he was summoned home. he was sure that it was to ruin.
there were lines in his forehead, a little silver in his hair and short beard. the rime, the breath of the fir wood clung about him. in valeria’s hair there was silver. she met him alone, beneath the old olive tree, upon the slope before the villa in the alban hills. he had sent those with him another way; he came to her alone with, in his step, the eagerness of youth. she stood robed in white; she had for him who, in the wilderness, had increased in inward stature, a new beauty and majesty.
“hail, valerian!”
“hail, valeria!” each held the other, embraced. “long—long—long has it been!”
they climbed the hillside. “are you safe, valerian,—are you safe, here at rome, where you should be so safe—”
“not i! to-morrow, c?sar may send to tell me, ‘open your veins. die, and ease me of a jealousy!’—well, what odds? it comes one day. what matter which day?”
the old household slaves came about them. it was springtime and evening and loveliness. as they reclined at supper, as afterwards they walked the terrace, and at last in their chamber he watched valeria. love rekindled in him, but a graver love, a love that was beginning to think.{251}
“we have changed,” he said.
“yes. there is a worker, a sculptor, a musician dealing with us.”
“life?”
“life also is under its hand.... in these years that i have dwelled here, lonely but for it, i have felt it working. it works from a place that our places hide.”
“i learned something of that in those dark, northern woods, by those cold and deathly waters. there is something more than we know or feel.”
“there is a sky above the sky. but that is all i know. i do not yet breathe under it.”
days and nights passed. valerian rested with valeria in the villa among the hills, unbidden to rome, possibly unthought of, perhaps unthreatened. he began to feel in the peace about him that he had dreamed that there was lightning in the clouds and an ambush in the way. and then he was bidden, he with his wife, to a feast in c?sar’s house.... when he came there, he saw that all the time the sky had been truly overcast.
c?sar made a feast of phantasy and extravagance. the colours seemed all gold, or else the hue of wine. the emperor reclined, garlanded, and all the guests were garlanded, and beautiful slaves served the tables with drink and viands fantastically choice, and flower petals were shred upon them from above. voluptuous music mixed with the silver fall of fountains. at intervals dwarfs or jugglers or gladiators made entertainment, or dancers came like snow or fire into the huge pillared room. there flowed talk and talk and laughter. valerian and valeria had their places where c?sar might observe that general, too liked by soldiers and provincials! to an outcast looking in great{252} and fine might have seemed the feast, to an angel looking down it might have glittered evil, shouted evil.
there were many women. valeria made to greet those with whom she had acquaintance—no great number, so shut away for so long had she lived. but they greeted back with the lips only, and very coldly. it was evident that none here wished to be called the friend of the wife of valerian. she felt for valerian a passion of sympathy. she sat, watching carefully her own words and smiles lest anywhere they might not serve his fortunes. she thought that now she could know no hurt save where he knew hurt.
for the most part the women here were patrician women whose minds lay rank earth for the growing of ill weeds. for the most part the men of the feast mated them well. virtue there was in the empire, virtue even here, but here, in proportion, little virtue.... valeria, regarding the women, saw livia and porcia and lucilla, and others like the three.
they had riches, the energetic men of their houses gaining, long since, lands and honours and wealth. slaves there were by the score and the hundred to take from them effort in behalf even of their own persons. they might make it if they chose, putting aside the offices of slaves. but it took virtue and hardness to make that effort, and from childhood they had had no training. one in blood and bone and force with their men, they might not be soldier, nor administrator, nor statesman, nor public official, nor trader, nor teacher, nor physician, nor orator, nor athlete, nor student in the schools. where there were children there were slave nurses, slave tutors. the huge household, the “familia,” was largely managed by skilled slaves. everywhere initiative, restless energy, came hard{253} against the inner wall of law and the outer wall of custom, and they were walls to keep in prisoners! high and thick though they were, this age saw some breaking through toward freedom from that grasp of law, that backward clutch from equal standing in human rights. but the breaking through seemed futile because it went not all the way, went but the smallest portion of the way, and so could come into but weak relations with the whole.
but there was one road upon which initiative was not blocked. the patrician woman with youth, with fair youth, with beauty, with some beauty, with wit to make store gain more store, and sensual to match sensual men, might have power, power, power—illegitimate, indirect, useless and selfish power! the time was one of libertinism, and there were libertines, men and women, and they seemed to sit in the chairs of the fates and to spin and cut the threads of destiny.
valeria saw that livia looked at her full, then with a laugh looked away. the man that was livia’s lover was that one who desired valerian’s command. and now livia was placed near to c?sar and had snared him with her thick eyelashes and the ivory tower of her throat. she saw lucilla speaking to the man beside her, and he was that senator who most coveted valerian’s land. she saw how many of valerian’s foes were here, and that c?sar looked blackly upon him. she thought that he had been commanded here in order that there might be snatched and perverted some word that he might drop.... she felt a depth of anger and despair.
guests were yet entering. now a movement showed beyond c?sar a white-robed, honour-heaped figure—the figure of a priestess of vesta, bidden to this feast....{254}
valeria felt a shock of delight, a glow from head to foot. her hand touched valerian’s. “look! it is flavia!”
“i see.... show no love for anything here to-night save for c?sar and those whom he loves.”
as best she might she obeyed. every down-drifting rose-leaf, every throb of music touched her senses like a cry of danger. she had seen in a forest doe or hare quiver when twig rubbed against twig.... but the vestal her daughter, seeing her, gave an exclamation. “my mother and father—i did not know that they would be here!” she smiled upon them, down the long board—several noted it.... flavia was brightly fair, and she loved lights and music and flowers and all these people. c?sar sent her wine from his own flagon.
on, with a kind of ordered tumult, went the feast. to valerian, aware of damocles’ sword above him, to valeria sharing that awareness, it was long—long!
then came in a dancer. the clearing of a space for her alone, the fanfare of trumpets that brought her in, seemed to betoken her famed in her art. she came, beautiful, with brown, waving locks, half nude, dancing wonderfully. she was iras the greek, daughter of lais the flower-seller.
c?sar’s guests applauded her dancing. she came on twinkling feet to one and to the other. she carried a thyrsus tipped with a pine cone, wound with leaves and blossoms. this she dipped into fountain spray as she passed, then shook it above this one and that one, showering him with diamonds. this man and that man, drunken, turning, strove to clasp her by arm or waist, but she danced away from him, shaking the thyrsus, shaking her brown locks. she spoke familiarly to any she chose, moving from point to point as lightly as thistledown.{255}
when she came to the vestal flavia she touched her robe with the pine cone. “hail, priestess! in what world might thou and i be sisters?”
flavia answered, touching with her fingers the diamonds that the thyrsus showered, “in the grave, iras the dancer!” and laughed herself because she had answered apropos.
the dancer, flashing on, came at last to valerian. she lifted her thyrsus. “who is it? who is it? i have seen him before, but not at banquets—”
“the general valerian,” said one behind her.
“valerian!” iras the dancer stood still, seemed with some kind of shock to receive the name, then with a laugh she raised the thyrsus and holding it in both hands, crosswise above her head, danced away on yet swifter feet. but she had stood beside valerian, and that one who had spoken had looked from face to face. and valerian, by one of his most few friends, had been warned against that man that he was of the host of delators, a spy and informer.
after the dancer came in gladiators. the feasting men and women sank lower. the room seemed unsteadily lit, smelled of wine and blood. the flowers withered, speech became confused, meaningless, save that always it menaced good. c?sar sent wine to valerian, more wine and more. he must drink, though he saw that they would have him drunken and his tongue loosened. three came about him and drove the talk to the legions and what, given word, a mind-endowed general might do. c?sar’s cup-bearer brought him more wine. he strove to be wary in talk, but at last came a mist and he saw only that he was talking.... came the last viand, the last red and golden wine, outside rose the dawn. and then without, in the misty{256} garden of the c?sars, the guests yet strayed, and yet there was revelling. but at last, with the rising sun, all might go home.
two days and valerian received an order to return to his country-house and there hold himself captive, while before the senate was sifted a charge of betraying the commonwealth. valerian went and with him valeria. it was the late summer, and the air was sultry and there were many thunder-storms with in between a sense of burdened waiting. morn and eve, the two paced the terrace and looked to rome afar in the plain. they had their slaves, but freedmen, clients of valerian, came no more as they had done, obsequious, many as bees to a garden. and old friends did not come, and kindred did not come. only two or three came privily, speaking not of their coming either before the visit or afterwards. faustus the philosopher, now an old man, came more than once. and all who came and all who stayed away knew that bolts were being forged with which to slay valerian. and they trembled for themselves who were his kin or acquaintance.
valeria would have caught the bolts in her hands, directed them if she might to her bosom only, but there was no way. but all that knew knew that she, too, would be struck, blackened, and consumed. always, c?sar finally to ruin one ruined many.... when they had been at the country-house a month those who still had come came no more. they heard that kindred and friends were being thrown into prison. faustus brought that news, and smiling said that hardly might he come again.
“faustus, this world!”
“there are many things to be straightened. when we have straightened one, then must we straighten another....{257} if with all our will we could reach the centre we might straighten much at once. but that is wisdom and few are wise!”
he spent a day and night at the villa, looked cheerfully upon them, and went back to rome where he had work to do. he came no more, and their hearts told them that he had been taken in the net.
a slave, the woman who had nursed her, brought the dire news of flavia, flavia in the house of the vestals! the two were in the garden, seated upon a marble bench, gazing idly at the fish in the sunken marble basin.
came the slave and threw herself at valeria’s feet, clasping her knees. “mistress! mistress!”
“ina! ina! what is it?”
“i went to the foot of the vineyard. one i knew passed from the city. it is talking—it is talking—”
“of what, ina? of what?”
“oh, flavia, mistress!—flavia! flavia!”
“flavia!”
“rome talks. it says that she, a vestal, has been unchaste! the proof has been gathered, even to-day she is judged and condemned!” ina’s voice rose to a shriek. “it says that the earth will be opened and flavia be buried living!”
valerian beat his head against the marble, but valeria sat like the marble’s self. when at last she spoke, moved her limbs, rose and went about through the place and the time and the small, slow events of existence, it was like a being drugged. in her eyes might be seen one bound down.... there was no help—what help was there in all rome and the world?
it might be that the vestal was innocent, or it might be{258} that youth and fire in the blood and some untoward nearness and temptation had dragged her into that pit. either way, she was to perish, seeing that certainly the people had been made to believe her guilty. believing her so, there was no force to hold them from throwing her to the law which of old the roman men had made. as though the two heard it with their ears, they heard the outcry of the thousands against sacrilege and broken law! they heard the outcry for flavia’s death by the old, terrible way!
in the night-time, life came back to valeria’s veins. the broken will rose and mended itself. reason said no doing now would help, but something beyond reason yet resisted, because resistance must not be lost. she rose, she left valerian sleeping, heavy with sorrow; she woke ina and took from her a coarse dark mantle; she clad and sandalled herself, and silently passed from the house, and crossing the terrace, went down through the almond trees and the vineyard to the road. she had put a brown stain upon her face; stooping, in the slave’s mantle, she seemed an old woman. what throbbed in her brain was the intent to reach c?sar, at least to cry to him of the wrath of the gods.
in an hour there overtook her a cart from the hills, bearing grapes and melons to market. she begged a lift, and the boy driving let her seat herself upon the cart floor among the baskets. when he asked she told him that she was a fortune-teller, come out to the hills to search for a certain herb.—no, she had not found it. perhaps it did not grow anywhere any longer.—“what is its name?”—“justice.”
she passed with the boy through the gates at dawn. leaving him and his cart she stole afoot through the grey streets to the palatine. there she found the stairway, cut{259} in the rock, leading to the summit and the palace where dwelt c?sar, and here at the foot in a broad space where were always beggars and petitioners she sat down, drew her mantle yet farther over her brow, and extended her hand as if for begging. when the day was here, surely at some hour, c?sar would come by!
much after sunrise, a portly, good-natured-looking personage approached, passed, and passing tossed her a small coin. she put out her hand and clasped his mantle and asked if c?sar would that day leave the palace, come this way. “it is probable—it is probable!” said the good-natured personage and went on to climb the hill.
noon came and afternoon. a stream went up the stair, a stream came down the stair, but never c?sar.
when the sun was westering fast valeria crossed to a legless man under an ilex tree. “is c?sar never coming down to throw us money?”
“have you feet,” said the legless man, “and see not all that happens in the world?—c?sar is not in the palace. he is at his villa on the appian way. he went there yesterday and with him a troop of those of the wilder sort—not sober children like you and me!”
it was twilight when she went by the house of the vestals, and going, raised her arms to the darkening sky. flavia was not in that house. she was away from the mercies of vesta. she was in prison, and out by the gate of the sabine road they opened the earth....
valeria’s senses swam. to give her strength she bought bread with the coin yet in her hand, and ate it as she walked. it was now night, and the ways no longer crowded. she was moving toward the appian gate. carts rumbled by, then passed horse-litters or palanquins borne by slaves;{260} there were people afoot, revellers and tavern-haunters, romans on graver business, freedmen, slaves, beggars, men and old women, women of the streets and those who accompanied them. dogs prowled, there came strains of music, flashes from swinging lanterns, stretches of vacancy and darkness. she passed a shop with a painted rose for sign and entered one of those spaces of what seemed dark emptiness. seemed, for presently she heard before her stumbling feet and sobbing breath, and overtook a woman, going also toward the appian gate.
there appeared to be no one abroad here in the night-time who concerned them or gave them notice.... they came together to the gate, not closed yet for the night. a press of folk of the poorer sort were going and coming. a keeper stopped the two, demanding their business. “i sell flowers,” said the woman, “and an order has gone wrong! i must out to my patron’s to see about it. why, you know me—lais the greek!”
it seemed that that was true. the man struck her upon the shoulder, took a kiss and let her by. he thought that the other woman, who seemed old and bent, was of her company. the two passed to rome without the walls. the night was powdered with stars. before them stretched the appian way with the great tombs upon it, and backward upon either hand, rich gardens and villas. there was far to go to c?sar’s house upon this road.
lais the greek sobbed again. “what doubt that i too die, and my shop? and what care i now if we do?”
valeria walked in silence. she looked before her, but truly she was seeing the waste field outside the sabine gate.
but it seemed that the other woman had passed one{261} silence and not come to another. “men—men! d?mons are their gods and d?mons are themselves!... it is true what the christians say.... so many years ago, valerian, but all things find us out!”
“valerian,” said valeria. “lais the flower-seller.... where are you going, lais?”
“to c?sar’s villa. you do not look old any longer. i have seen you before. who are you?”
“valeria is my name.... why are you going to c?sar?”
“valeria! valeria! i might have guessed that! you are going, too, to beg, beg, beg with your face against c?sar’s feet!—oh, your daughter, too! oh, that vestal for whom they dig a chamber under ground—”
“where is your daughter, the dancer?”
“valerian’s daughter? in danger. are not all things that are valerian’s in danger? i, a poor freedwoman, i too shall perish, as will you, valeria.... but it is these daughters. ai! ai! the daughters of women!”
they made on. in the dimness the flower-seller, coming against some obstruction, stumbled and was brought to the ground. valeria stooping helped her rise. the touch drew each to each. they stood for a moment under the stars, clinging close, each to each.
“how,” asked valeria, “is thy daughter in danger?”
“was spawned an intelligencer, a spy! he swelled and lives to hunt out all who have blood the colour of valerian’s! some neighbour told him.... went a word to the wolf-dogs, ‘iras the dancer has blood the very colour! perhaps in secret valerian cherishes her, and will be hurt by her hurt, as by the vestal’s—’”
“oh-hh!{262}”
“what does woman’s moaning do?... they took my girl, saying that she was to dance at c?sar’s feast.—o hecate, hear me! we thought it only a palace feast with men and women and toying and dallying! i kissed her and laughed when she went. that was yesterday. no, it was the day before yesterday. yesterday it was that i heard through priscus of ruin and death, blooming for all that ever were called valerian’s—blooming so for the dancer iras!”
“o flavia, thy woe!—o the flowers of this garden!”
“then i went with priscus whom i had nursed of a fever and who is a christian and has a brother who serves a knight that is of c?sar’s band. so by littles we learned—but that brought it to this very sunset.... so i heard that she was taken to that villa where devil’s ill is done. c?sar is there, and men of c?sar’s bosom!”
they had come to cypress trees by a huge and marble tomb. lais’s limbs failed her, she sank upon the earth and stretched her arms along it. valeria, standing, regarded the huge shadow of the night. her lips moved. “women against men—crowned men.... helpless—helpless! where they will ravin, they will ravin. where are our arms, where are our minds, where are our souls?... and some they make courtesans, and some they make vestals. and the one they feed upon, and they cry for more women for food. and the other must be pure, and if she breaks their law—once, once—they slay her, making for her a terrible death! and each way they themselves are lawless and cruel. and where is any advocate, and any god?”
lais rose from the earth—they went on together—they had miles to go. hurrying all they might, lurking in shadows of tombs while other night-farers went by, the{263} night was late when they came to the grove that was c?sar’s, and the wall that enclosed a vast garden, and the long gleam, far from the road, showing that country-house, lighted still, revelling still!
they would not go to the gate and the lodge with the pr?torians there—that would be almost certainly never to pass! they sought where they might climb the garden wall. a stream went by, close below the walls, flowing to tiber. turning from the road, they went along this water, moving out of the moonlight, under the shadow of the wall, seeking some stout twist of the over-covering ivy. what they should do when they reached the garden, when they reached the house where spread before every door would be guards and slaves, they did not know. they knew that what they did must be called hopeless. yet was there a wildness of hope. they did not think at all of themselves. one saw only flavia, the other iras. they themselves were already dead, and valerian was dead, but there were the daughters....
they came, still seeking through the ivy, to a door in the wall, clamped with iron. they tried it, but it was fast, resisting all their strength. lais leaned against it. “i tremble, i tremble!... o iras! thou wast truly my all!”
they went a little farther, still creeping by the wall. the bank here was steep, the stream turbid and swollen from a recent storm among the mountains. it went by them with a hollow sound, and the moon whitened the wave. something lay beside the bank, caught and uplifted by a great stone, half in, half out of the water. when they came to it they saw that it was the naked body of a woman.... lais put her arms beneath and raised it wholly upon the bank. there was no life, and there had{264} been many a wrong inflicted before life went. lais began to laugh. “iras! get up and dance, iras! dance for c?sar, and every man his friend!”
when valeria saw that there was no moving her, nor making her attend, nor drawing her farther, nor winning her to go back, nor help for her, nor any sense that might be appealed to, she left the flower-seller there, the dead girl in her arms. she herself went on, feeling among the ivy for that twisted stem to climb by. she found such an one, put hand and foot to it and mounted to the top of the wall, crept over it and dropped into the garden beneath. she was in a laurel grove with a white statue rising from the middle, then in a long alley of like trees. the branches arched into a low roof, the moon was shut out, she had a sense of suffocation, she felt the chamber underground by the sabine gate. her hands, locked before her, beat the dark. the alley widened, she came out into the light and saw and heard c?sar’s house, flaming with lamps, yelling with drunken mirth.
slaves stopped her ere she reached the door. her will, one-pointed, strove to bear all through. “i have a message for c?sar! woe is, if he does not hear it!”
“who let her pass? she came on a wind from the mountains.—she is a sibyl!—c?sar may flay us if we do not let her in.—call the captain of the guard!”
he came—a man who had been bred upon the hills in sight of rome.
“i have a message for c?sar. it imports him to hear!”
“take the mantle from her.—valeria, wife of valerian, i guess that message!”
yet she saw c?sar, and flung herself at his feet. he was drunken and sated. “take her away! send her to rome.{265} let her see the vestal punished who defiled the house of vesta!”
“c?sar! my message—”
the emperor’s eyes closed. “there was left an order to bring that same valerian to the mamertine. when she has seen the vestal buried, fling her with valerian there!”
dark was that chamber of the mamertine where at the last she came to valerian. she came with white hair though she was not old. they sat side by side, all things being now so equal, and feared not the coming death. when finally daggers and ropes were brought them they took the keen blades in their hands with a smile.
“how much have we been through together!” said valerian. “this little, low door also!”
“we are greater than we know, and have been longer together than we remember. farewell, valerian, until i see thee again, and may it not be long!”
each marked and drove the dagger into the vital place. the blood gushed, their hands clasped, their eyes darkened.
