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Lion's Brood

<h3> VI. </h3> <h3> ALLIES. </h3> Night had come again, before Marcia could arouse herself from the deep sleep with which exhaustion of mind and body had overwhelmed her. She remembered the scenes of the banquet as the phantasms of a dream—strange and terrible; for her thoughts were slow to gather the threads and weave the woof. Only a feeling of failure, of fruitless abasement, was ever present. Hannibal had admired her, but, proof against any controlling attraction, he had put her words aside with little short of contempt. A dread, even, lest the strange acumen of this wonderful man had pierced her mask, and that her very motive and mission were already suspected, was not lacking to add dismay to discouragement. Such thoughts were but wretched company, and they brought with them a vague conception of her own vain egotism in imagining the possibility of other outcome. She tried to sleep again, but could not. What mattered it though, by some shifting of hours, her day had become night and her night day! She must arise and talk with some one, if it were only the host whom she so heartily despised. Attendants entered at her summons, and the refreshment of the bath and the labour of the toilet were once more passed through. Then, dismissing the slaves, she walked out alone into the garden and sat down on a softly cushioned seat of carved marble. A fountain plashed soothingly in the foliage near by, the stars were shining again, while, from without, the jarring sounds of the city came to her ears. How long she sat, awake yet thinking of nothing, dull and dazed, she could not tell. Then she was aroused by a sandalled step upon the pavement. A man was standing before her, whose face, despite its youthful contours, was deep-lined and melancholy. He was short of stature and slenderly though gracefully built, and his black curls clustered over brow and eyes that seemed rather those of a poet or a dreamer than of a man of action. In the sombre, dark blue garments of mourning, without ornaments or jewels, so different from the gay banqueting robes in which she had last seen him, Marcia gazed a moment, before she recognized Perolla, the son of Pacuvius. "You are not pretty to-night, Scylla," he said tauntingly, "though you left us early. There are dark circles under the eyes that looked kindly at the enemy of your country." Marcia flushed crimson, and he went on: "Yes; I watched you smiling and ogling, but it will take greater traitors than you to snare him. He is like Minos, in that he did not reach out to take from your hands the purple lock shorn from your father's head: he is not like him otherwise: he is not just, and he will not give honourable terms." "You, at least, are faithful to Rome?" said Marcia, slowly, and ignoring his insults. "Can you ask?" he answered; "is it that you wish to betray me? Well, then, know truly that I have betrayed myself to your heart's content. Do you not see the mourning garments I wear for my city's faithlessness and for her coming ruin? Have you not heard how my father dragged me from the side of Decius Magius in the market place that I might attend the banquet?—ah! but you have not heard how I had planned to startle them all." Marcia began to wonder whether she was talking with a madman. "Shall I tell?" She made a sign of assent. "It was toward evening—they have but just risen from the tables now. Then, it was to seek the red feathers for the third time; but I led my father back among the rose bushes and showed him a sword which I had girt to my side, beneath my tunic. 'This,' said I, 'shall win us pardon from Rome. Look you, when we return, I will plunge it into the Carthaginian's breast.'" Marcia bent forward eagerly. "And then," he went on, "my father bound my arms to my sides, with his own around me, and wept and talked of our recent pledges to these foreigners. 'Can they outweigh our ancient pledges to Rome?' I answered. So he pleaded how the attendants would surely cut me down, and mentioned Hannibal's look, which he affirmed I would not be able to confront; but I laughed and made little of these things. Then he spoke of the hospitable board, which I admitted had something of reason; and, finally, when he had declared that the sword must reach Hannibal only through his own breast, then, at last, from filial duty, mark you, I threw the weapon from me, telling him that he had betrayed his country thrice: in revolting from Rome, in allying with foreigners, and, now, in turning aside the instrument of escape. Then we returned to the banquet, but my father trembled, and ate and drank no more. There, now, is a story to tell your city's destroyer. If you betray me, perhaps he may yet love you." Marcia viewed him sternly. "Truly your father was right, when he said you were ill in mind." "Yes, ill in mind and in heart." "How, then, do you not recognize one whose heart is sicker than your own?" Perolla looked at her inquiringly, and she went on:— "You have a city that has been false to itself, and is in danger of punishment—a father, too, if you will. My city has already suffered every evil but destruction: my brother and he to whom Juno was about to lead me have been killed by these pulse-eaters. Are such things the benefits that go to make friendship and love for the slayers? Say, rather, hate and the craving for revenge." "Yes," said Perolla, moodily; "they are indeed evils, but less than mine, in that they are passed—" "And is Rome safe, do you think?" she asked quickly. "Rome will conquer," he said doggedly, "unless there be many more traitors like you." "Fool!" she cried, grasping his wrist. "Can you not see—you who claim to be a philosopher and to have Greek blood?—you, at least, should have understood my words." He gazed at her vacantly, and she began to regret her vehemence. It came to her mind that this was not altogether a safe man to trust with her secret. Faithful he was, no doubt; but a fool might be even more dangerous than a traitor. Still, she had said too much to be silent, and she felt the need of some ally to whom she could talk—upon whom she could at least pretend to lean when the weight of her burden was heaviest. "I have told you what I have lost—what I dread to lose. Now learn what I am here to gain. For many days after the black news of Cannae, I heard them talking in my father's house—talking of the advance of the insolent victors and of the paltry defence we could oppose, the certain destruction that awaited us. Still they were brave—old men and boys. The soldiers were dead, but we set to work training new—shaping them alike out of youth and age and bondmen; and the slayers of our citizens delayed, and we gained strength and courage. In every temple of the twelve gods it was the same prayer by day and night: 'Grant us delay. Grant us that the winter may find him in the south!' At last came the news that he was advancing to Capua, and rumours of a Carthaginian party in the city. From Capua, seized with all its engines of war, was but a few days to Rome. Then I took a resolve and made a vow: tell me, am I beautiful?" "Beautiful as Venus." "Know, then, that I have dedicated this beauty to her, that she may guard Rome and avenge me upon Rome's enemies." He shook his head stupidly. "Minerva does not favour me, lady," he replied; "for I do not understand your words." "Listen!" she went on, with the earnestness of desperation, "He shall love me—he or one who can sway him—and they shall play the laggards here, until the winter gives us time—and time brings safety." He understood her now, but still he shook his head. "If you speak truth," he said slowly, "you speak foolishness as well. Hannibal will love no mistress but Carthage, and there is no man living who shall sway him by a hair's breadth. Now I see why you spoke to him of plots at Rome and of the wisdom of delay. Ah! a woman to make game of him!" and he threw back his head and laughed. "Do you imagine he has not divined your plot? Give him your beauty if you will. He will take it, doubtless, if he have time, and march north forthwith, after you have confessed your little plottings beneath the hot tweezers. Only one thing shall stay him—steel,—and in the hands of man—not blandishments in the mouth of a girl." Marcia was in despair. "And is there no help," she cried, "for me, a Roman woman, from you, a friend of Rome? Surely we shall be stronger together, even if our plots are different. Two plans are better than one." Before he could frame his answer they heard footsteps coming toward them, and then a man, enveloped in the brown cloak of a slave, pushed aside the foliage and glided out into the moonlight. Perolla, wheeling about, had half drawn his sword, while Marcia shrunk back into the shadow. "Put up your sword, my Perolla," said the newcomer, speaking in low tones and throwing aside his mantle. "Decius Magius, by all the gods!" cried the young man; "but why are you disguised?" "Because, my friend," said Magius, slowly "Capua is no longer free; because spies of the Carthaginian and of our senate are watching my house, making ready to seize me. Decius Magius can no longer walk in his own city, clad in his own gown, and to-morrow, doubtless, he cannot walk at all. Therefore I wish to speak with you, and I have put on this disguise in order that I might gain your house unobserved, and that your father might not die of fright, learning me to be here." "But how did you enter? how find me?" "I entered, my Perolla, because your porter, like every slave in Capua, is drunk to-night, and because the boy whom he left to keep the gate was only enough awake to mumble that you were in the garden." Perolla frowned. Then, suddenly, he remembered Marcia, concerning whom his suspicions were not yet entirely removed, and he raised his hand in warning. "There is a woman here—a Roman woman, who tells a strange story," he whispered. "It is better to be discreet." "The time for discretion is past for Decius Magius," said the other, wearily. "Let him at least speak freely upon his last night of freedom." Marcia came forward. "Is it permitted a Roman maid to honour a Campanian who is true to his city's faith?" "Assuredly, daughter," replied Magius, quietly. She could not see his face except that it was stern and gray-bearded; but, kneeling down beside him, she took his hand and poured out the story of her life, her sorrow, her resolve, and its prosecution. Here, at least, was a man upon whose faith and judgment she could rely, and his manner grew more gentle as she made an end of speaking. "So you doubted her truth, my Perolla," he said softly. "That is because you have not felt her hand tremble, and because you are too young and too much of a philosopher to judge of the honesty of a woman's face. The same instinct that tells me, doubtless warned Hannibal also that this was not a courtesan, much less an immodest woman well born, and, least of all, a coward who would flee her city, or a traitress who would betray it. You will know more of such things, my Perolla, when you learn to study them less." Then, turning to Marcia, he went on: "What you have designed, my daughter, is noble and worthy of your race—and yet, while I commend, I am slow to encourage. Are you strong to carry your sacrifice to the uttermost?" Marcia shuddered. "Yes, if there be need," she said, in a low voice; "I look to no marriage now. Is not the Republic worthy of our best?" "It is a hard thing," he said, doubtfully, "for a woman well born and modest to belong to a man she hates." "But it is easy to die, my father, as died Lucretia." Decius Magius looked at her. Several times his lips moved as if about to speak, and, once, he turned away sharply for a moment, as if to gaze up into the night. "Tell me, my father," she said earnestly, "do you give me no hope? Is not my beauty worth the purchase of a few paltry months? And then comes the winter, bringing safety." Still Magius said nothing for several minutes, and when he spoke, it was in harsh, quick tones. "Yes, it is all possible, as you say it." "Hannibal to surrender his plans for a woman?" cried Perolla, scornfully. "Surely, my Decius, you jest. Do you not know him—that only the gods can turn him from his purpose?" Marcia had wheeled about with flashing eyes and faced the last speaker. "You have shown me the way," she cried. "It is the gods who shall delay him." Perolla gazed at her in astonishment, as at one gone mad, but Magius nodded and frowned. "It is the best chance," he said slowly, "the only one." "Still Minerva does not favour me," said Perolla, shaking his head; but Marcia went on in a high, nervous voice and with a gayety that made the older man draw his cloak up to his face in pity:— "Come, my philosopher, you are indeed stupid to-night. If you did not observe it at the house of the Ninii, you should have heard me just now when I told the story of the banquet to my lord Decius. It is Iddilcar, the priest of Melkarth, who shall bring his god to be my ally—Rome's ally: Iddilcar, who could not so much as take his eyes from me, through all their feasting. There is the man who will prefer my beauty, even to his god's favour; and surely your Hannibal will not wage war against the auspices." The face of Magius was still shaded by his cloak, and he said nothing; but over the features of the younger man came strange expressions: first amazement, then horror, then a look which had something of horror but more of yearning. He held out his hands in supplication. "No—no," he cried. "You shall not do it. You are too beautiful. First I hated you, when I dreamed you to be but a courtesan traitress. Now—now—O gods favour me! Listen! you shall not do it. It is I who will kill him—yes, and you also first," and, turning suddenly away, he staggered. Then, as Magius raised his hand to support him, he shook himself free and ran furiously into the house. Marcia turned to Magius in astonishment, and he smiled sadly. "Even philosophers are not proof," he said; "and you are very beautiful—and he is young—and half a Greek." She blushed, and the grim senator took her hand. "May the gods grant, my daughter, that your sacrifice be not for nothing. You have spoken wisdom; but he—he is a madman. As for me, I am as one who is dead. Farewell." He dropped her hand, and she felt, rather than heard or saw him go; only her voice would not obey her when she strove to detain him, if but for a moment: the only man in Capua whom she could honour—upon whom she could rely. Surely he would not desert her thus?—yes, truly, he was gone. Then she ran several steps in the direction he had taken, and called, though she dared not call his name, until a female attendant came hurrying to answer her. "My lord, Perolla," said the girl, "had but just rushed out into the street, as if possessed of a daimon. As for a strange slave, she had observed no one; but if such there was, doubtless he had slipped by the porter's boy—who was worthless." Marcia groped her way to her sleeping apartment, harshly brushing aside an offer of aid. Once alone, she threw herself down upon the couch and burst into a torrent of moans and sobs. The girl, who had followed hesitatingly, listened in the hallway, nodding her head with conscious satisfaction. "And so the Roman women loved, for all they were said to be so grand and stern. What a fool this one was, though, to prefer the son to the father, who was much richer, and who, being old, would doubtless realize the necessity of being more generous." And she went back to the slaves' apartments, laughing softly to herself. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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