Neæra. A Tale of Ancient Rome

‘Stay, Fabricius, you are hasty,’ spoke Tiberius; ‘let us hear what these people have to say.’

Recalled to himself, Fabricius, with his eyes yet fixed on Neæra, stepped back to a place beside Thrasullus, without deigning his nephew a look or a word. Afer’s brows met with an angry scowl, and he abruptly folded his arms across his breast, whilst muttering some hasty wrathful words. Every one looked curiously on, and, in the momentary silence which suddenly ensued, the voice of Natta was heard, in an eager undertone, speaking to his fellow-servant. Urged by their keen interest the pair had pressed forward beyond their proper station, and were peering through the circle of their superiors at Neæra. The old steward’s demeanour was excited, but at the impatient sign of his master he and his companion fell back to their proper station.

‘Noble Fabricius here, a Senator of Augustus, well known to us of old days,’ said Tiberius, ‘lost a grandchild years ago. Unable to trace her, in spite of every effort, he yet preserves hope. The likeness which you have seen is that of the mother of the lost child. Fabricius has at last, he thinks, fair grounds for supposing he has recovered the missing girl. Be it our business to inquire into the proofs.’

‘To what purpose, uncle?’ said Afer, with angry impatience. ‘Is it not absurd to ground a belief upon a mere resemblance to a graven gem? It can only end in fruitless disgust, as hitherto. Cease to harass yourself any longer by pursuing an ignis fatuus; be guided by me, I pray you. Leave these impostors to me, as you were wont, and I will unmask them.’

‘I pray you, Caesar, proceed,’ said Fabricius briefly, without taking any notice of his nephew.

With an expression of unutterable disgust and anger, the knight fell back a pace or two. ‘With your permission, Caesar, I will retire,’ he said; ‘I cannot listen to this folly.’

‘It is my will that you remain; try, therefore, and endure what shall follow,’ replied Tiberius.

‘I must obey your wish,’ said Afer, biting his lip.

‘Woman!’ said Tiberius, addressing himself to Tibia, ‘tell us your name and where you dwell. Speak without fear.’

‘My name is Tibia, and I dwell in Surrentum,’ answered the dame. She began in low nervous tones, and then gathering courage from the conviction of her deep injuries, she proceeded more hurriedly in a louder tone, ‘My home has, however, been ruined, and my husband Masthlion – ’

‘Enough!’ interrupted the Emperor, in a harsh, sudden voice; ‘answer only the questions you are asked. Anything beyond them concerns us nothing. You are now a widow – let that suffice. How long have you dwelt in Surrentum?’

‘About twenty years.’

‘And is this girl the child of you and your husband?’

‘No; we never had a child.’

‘How then did you come by her?’

‘My brother brought her to us to foster, when she was a little child, about fifteen years ago.’

‘Was she his child?’

‘No. He said she was an orphan – the child of a fellow-workman in Rome.’

Afer shrugged his shoulders, and glanced toward Fabricius, who was gazing intently and unmoved upon the females.

‘Has she remained with you ever since?’

‘Yes.’

‘Have you always led her to believe she was really your own child? Did she never discover that she did not belong to you?’

‘She was never told till a few minutes past in this house.’

‘Did you never know of this before, maiden?’

‘No.’

‘Did your brother never visit her, woman?’

‘We never saw him again until a few weeks back. We thought he must be dead, never having even heard of him.’

‘You then thought of the child as your own?’

‘We never thought she would be taken from us again, and we looked upon her as our own.’

‘What brought your brother back again after so long a silence?’

‘He had had a bad illness in Rome, and he came to Surrentum for change and fresh air to help him to get better.’

‘Why did he not come to see the child, or at least send to learn of her welfare during all those years?’

‘I cannot tell. He said he knew she was in good keeping.’

‘And did not you or your husband ever think proper to communicate with this brother of yours respecting the child he had left in your charge, since he himself was so careless of her?’

‘Not until a few weeks ago, when my husband went to Rome to seek him, but never found a trace of him.’

‘Why did he go, then, at last?’

‘It was when she was asked in marriage,’ said Tibia, with hesitation. ‘My husband thought it was his duty to tell my brother, but he could not find a trace of him.’

‘Then after this your brother arrived at Surrentum of his own accord?’

‘Yes; he was weak and thin.’

‘Did he give you no account of himself for the time he had been silent?’

‘No.’

‘Did he tell you anything further concerning the girl?’

The dame’s head sank gradually.

‘Speak, good woman,’ said Fabricius; ‘no harm shall come of it.’

‘He said,’ Tibia continued, in a low voice, ‘that he told a lie when he came first with the child. She was not the child of a fellow-workman, but was nobly born, and had been stolen.’

‘Of course,’ said Afer ironically.

‘From whom, then, did he say she had been taken?’

‘From one called Balbus, a wealthy man; but he said this to deceive us – I know now there is no such person.’

‘You say you have dwelt in Surrentum twenty years, being about five years before the child was brought to you. Can you produce any people of the town who can testify that you have been childless, and that she came as you relate?’

Tibia did not answer, but looked at Fabricius.

‘I have seen several such townspeople very privately, Caesar,’ said Fabricius, ‘and, from the evidence I gathered, I am perfectly satisfied that this worthy woman speaks absolute truth.’

‘Enough, then, for that,’ said Tiberius; and he turned to exchange some whispered words with Thrasullus.

‘We will now hear your brother’s story,’ he resumed. ‘Zeno, bring him in before us.’

Fabricius slowly removed his eyes from the fair face of Neæra and turned them on his nephew, who stood with an impatient, scornful expression of face, gazing fixedly on the dame.

The ring of bystanders parted, and Cestus walked into their midst with a bold, not to say triumphant air. His face had recovered its normal habit. When matters arrived at a crisis with the sudden departure of Neæra, there was left no occasion for secrecy. But rather the reverse since his interview with Fabricius, so that the dye had been suffered to fade from his skin, and the razor had removed his bristly beard and moustache.

He made an awkward obeisance to Caesar, and then turned to his former patron. The moment for revenge, so long waited and thirsted for, had at last arrived, and his broad, coarse face gleamed with diabolical exultation and malignance.

His significant gaze directed the eyes of the rest toward the unhappy knight, whose demeanour had suffered a change which was as extraordinary as it was sudden. He seemed as if an icy, deathlike hand had seized upon his heart and turned him to stone. His fixed eyes were glassy, and his face drawn and ghastly white.

‘Good morrow, patron,’ said Cestus, with a fiendish grin; ‘you thought you had paid me off in full the last time we were together, but here I am again, and, like a good client, still devoted to your affairs.’

His voice seemed to break a horrible fascination. Afer recovered himself, and drew a long silent breath as he glanced around. Fabricius had seen enough in his heart-stricken nephew’s face, and was now again sternly avoiding his gaze. A dull, sickly dread numbed the heart of the knight and whispered fatefully in his ear. But extremity of peril nerved him with the courage and coolness of despair, and, collecting his faculties, he stood at bay, in readiness for the ominous storm which threatened him.

Withdrawing his attention from Afer, the Emperor devoted a few moments’ scrutiny to the Suburan.

‘Is this the brother you speak of, woman?’ he asked of Tibia.

‘Yes.’

‘Do you claim the kinship, fellow? Are you her brother?’

‘Yes, so please you, I am her brother.’

‘Your name?’

‘Cestus.’

‘And dwelling?’

‘In Rome – in the Subura.’

‘From the Subura – you have that appearance. From one of the darkest holes therein.’

‘There are some powerful and wealthy people in the Subura, Caesar, and we cannot all choose the best spots therein.’

‘Bandy no words. Do you know the maiden there by you?’

‘Yes – no one better. She is the granddaughter of the noble Fabricius there.’

‘How, then, came she to be living as the child of the woman your sister?’

‘I took her secretly away from the mansion of her grandsire fifteen years ago, all but three months less a day. I have kept the reckoning carefully – ask the noble Fabricius if I am not right.’

‘He has already told me this – he speaks truly, to the very day,’ said Fabricius.

‘Are you not afraid to confess this villainy?’ said Tiberius sternly.

‘It is because I wish to make the noble Fabricius some amends for the wrong, and for another reason, which all will soon understand.’

‘Why did you tell the woman, your sister, that you took her from one Balbus, a wealthy man?’

‘Because I did not choose to let out my secret and mention names – the time was not ripe then to bring the matter forward, and I was afraid it might be meddled with, and harm done instead of good. There was no such person as Balbus.’

‘What do you mean by the time being not ripe? Had you seen or heard of her since you first left her in Surrentum?’

‘Not once.’

‘It may be concluded from that you cared nothing whether she were alive or dead during all that time – is that so?’

‘Not so much as to take me to Surrentum to find out, I confess.’

‘Then why, after all that long silence, did you resolve to go to Surrentum! Say, what was your reason in stealing the child and hiding it away for fifteen years in order to restore it again?’

‘So please you, Caesar, the child was no more to me than any other, but she was of great importance to my patron, and he bargained and paid me seventy sestertia to secretly kill it. I was too soft-hearted to make away with it altogether, so I took it to Surrentum quietly and unknown to him, and there she has remained till now, as you see.’

‘And who is this patron?’

‘He stands there before you – Titus Afer.’

‘It’s a lie – a damnable lie!’ shouted the knight. ‘Dog! vagabond! whoever thou art, how darest thou say such a thing?’

His black eyes blazed amid the deathly pallor of his face, and a thrill of astonishment passed through the bystanders. Even Livia leaned forward in her seat with rapt attention.

‘Have a care,’ quoth Cestus, shrinking back, ‘or he will knife me again, as he did before.’

‘Command yourself, Afer,’ said Tiberius drily; ‘you shall have plenty of opportunity to reply.’

‘Am I to be traduced by such a villain, whom I never saw before? And in the face of these present? Do you, Fabricius, my uncle, whom I have served and loved as a son so long – do you countenance it in silence thus? Oh, monstrous! To be so gulled by a cunning knave after all that has been practised on you in the same fashion, and thus calmly to listen to such an outrage on your own flesh and blood – shame!’

‘Caesar has said you will have an opportunity, at a proper time, of disproving what this man says. Let us proceed and seek for the truth, and woe upon the evildoer,’ said Fabricius in hollow tones.

‘Ay, indeed, woe upon him,’ said Afer loudly.

‘Have you, then, cast me off, patron? Do you disown me after all my services?’ observed Cestus, with a grin.

‘No more of that, Suburan,’ cried Tiberius. ‘It is a grave charge to make against one of the rank and family of Titus Afer. Beware, if it be an idle piece of mischief.’

‘It’s nothing but sober truth, Caesar.’

‘Lying, cunning knave!’ hissed the knight.

‘It is easily explained,’ continued Cestus, with a rough laugh; ‘the noble Fabricius is vastly rich and his nephew wanted it all to himself – the girl was in the way.’

‘Execrable wretch!’ cried Afer, beside himself with terror and fury. He made a spring towards the Suburan, but those near him clung to his garments and arrested the movement. The Suburan, on his part, bounced back precipitately, and then seeing the knight’s advance stayed, broke out into a jeering, but, at the same time, nervous laugh.

‘Peace, I say again, Afer,’ said Tiberius more sternly; ‘the justness of your cause can surely well await until the end. Go on, Suburan, and relate the whole of your story of this affair. Add nothing, omit nothing, and be as brief as possible.’

Cestus did as he was required, and revealed the full extent of his relations with the knight, on whose pallid brow the perspiration gathered in drops with the violence of his emotions.

Step by step the pitiless tale went on, laying bare, with extreme minuteness, the whole history of the connection between noble and vagabond from its commencement. Nothing was omitted down to the last violent meeting by the Circus Maximus. Thence, in conclusion, the Suburan ran over the occurrences which we have already described.

‘And that is everything, Caesar,’ he said, when he had finished. ‘Every word I have said is truth – I swear it, by all the gods. If it were a lie, should I have been fool enough to have made myself out to be the thief? No, it is when thieves fall out that honest men get their own. I don’t seek to hide myself – not I; but for the man’s sake, who tempted me and hired me, I have made a clean breast of it and exposed myself. He paid me at last with a dagger thrust, like a false-hearted coward as he is, and now I’m even with him. See, here is the place – look at it for yourselves, and believe your own eyes!’

He hastily withdrew his tunic sufficiently to disclose the recently-healed scar in his left side, where Afer had struck his desperate blow.

‘Lying knave, this is some slash received in a drunken night-brawl in a Suburan stye, if it be there you dwell! The whole story is a fable, a cursed lie,’ broke in Afer again, whose aspect was ghastly to behold. ‘I know him not! Is this a return for my love, uncle? Shame that you should suffer it!’

‘Patience!’ said Tiberius, ‘let us finish. Fabricius, you have heard him confess that he decoyed you from your house, on a certain night, with a false tale about a comrade who was sick, and wished to see you, concerning your lost granddaughter – is it true, and do you recognise him?’

‘It is true enough,’ replied Fabricius, whose horror-stricken feelings were displayed distressingly in his voice and demeanour; ‘I seemed to remember his face again, and a thousand times, from Rome hither, have I tried to bring him more exactly to my mind. But now, as he related the occurrence, I recognised him – yes, it is the same wretch who came to me that night. His description of what occurred is perfect – it is too well graven on my mind. But for the timely appearance of the troop of Pretorians with Martialis the Centurion, the wretch would have succeeded only too well in his evil intent. This new infamy comes unexpectedly on me, Caesar, and it tries me hard – ’

‘Wine, and a seat for Fabricius,’ said Tiberius; and the attendants flew to obey.

‘Am I to bear this? Am I to listen to this’ – broke in Afer.

‘Peace, I say,’ said Tiberius; ‘drink and rest, Fabricius.’

The old senator drank the wine the attendants brought for him, and sank with trembling limbs into the chair they placed for him.

‘If what you have told us is true, Suburan, – and it is scarcely credible you would invent a tale to incriminate yourself to such a degree, – then your actions bring you within the reach of the rods of the lictors, and of the cord,’ resumed Tiberius, ‘but due attention shall be given to this at a proper time. What concerns us now is the identity of the child. Give us, therefore, the proofs that she is what you assert her to be.’

‘I have, already, given them to the noble Fabricius, so please you,’ said Cestus.

‘My slave bears them – bring them hither, Natta!’ said Fabricius.

The steward came forward before Caesar with the package of child’s garments, and displayed them to Tiberius on bended knee, whilst Fabricius attested them – particularly the amulet.

‘Come hither, woman,’ said Tiberius to Tibia; ‘do you know these things?’

‘They are what the child wore when she came to us – we took them off and kept them.’

‘They are not the dress of a poor man’s child. Did such a thought not strike you when you saw them at first.’

‘Yes; I asked him how she came by them, and he said her father had been very poor, so poor that a rich family had befriended him out of charity, and had dressed her in some cast-off clothes.’

‘That’s true! I told her so,’ said Cestus.

‘The memory of a liar should always be good,’ cried Afer; ‘this vagabond’s memory is only equalled by his lies – they are all of a prodigious nature. Yet I doubt if they are as monstrous as the credulity which sucks them in.’

‘What more remains to ask these people, Fabricius? Question them if you will,’ said Tiberius.

‘I have nothing to add to what your highness has ably said,’ replied Fabricius, rising from his seat. ‘I have already satisfied myself, by inquiries in Surrentum, that this woman is worthy, honest, and estimable in the opinion of the townspeople, and that her husband was likewise esteemed for the same qualities. Her word, therefore, is to be trusted, and it bears out the assertions of her misguided brother. I will tell you that some weeks ago I received a letter, saying that my grandchild was alive, and enclosing a piece of ribbon, which lies there before you. It is of unusual pattern. I went to the child’s room, and there found some more of the self-same fabric. I had been imposed upon many times, but this was the first news I had heard, which seemed to strike to my heart with the weight of conviction. It was like a message from the grave. I was deeply moved. A few nights ago this man appeared before me in my house, and related what you have heard, with the exception of the vile trick by which my own life was attempted. He brought these things as proofs of his words. I can find no flaws in his evidence, and I accept it. So please you, Caesar, here are two slaves of my household who served the mother and grandmother of this child. The memory of the mother should be strong within them. Let them say. Look upon this maiden, Natta and Verrus, and answer truly, as your hearts tell you, if she recall the image of the dead Fabricia, my daughter, your mistress.’

‘We have already looked upon her, master,’ replied Natta for both. ‘She is too near alike not to be the child of the dead Fabricia.’

‘We are all agreed as to the marked resemblance to the gem,’ observed Caesar.

‘I am satisfied; my heart – everything tells me she is my Aurelia,’ said Fabricius fervently.

‘Then it becomes Afer’s turn, for which he burns, to refute the charge which has been brought against him,’ Tiberius continued.

All eyes turned now upon the white, haggard visage of the knight, as he stood with tightly-folded arms and compressed lips.

‘I will be brief. I deny it all – it is an infamous lie, invented to impose upon a credulous old man,’ said he. ‘You have taken an unfair advantage; it would have been, at least, manly to have warned me. You have your witnesses gathered, and paid to brazen it out. Once concoct a tale, and the rest is easily arranged. Now, however, I hear of this for the first time. I have nothing to defend me but my bare word. Who am I to find in this island to support me, when even my uncle will not turn an ear to me? Long and bitter experience cannot cure his credulity. He swallows a plausible tale now as eagerly as formerly, when the child was first missing – only, with the difference, that in his present delusion he has no scruple in allowing suspicions to be raised of his own flesh and blood.’

‘I have not spoken one word to you, much less made a charge against you, though, like yourself, I have listened to one. Your conclusions are hasty, therefore,’ said Fabricius sternly; ‘you are under no restraint; you will be at liberty to gather what witnesses you may, and do anything you can to disprove what has been said. No one will be more pleased than myself to know of your success. I do not condemn on the word of one man; at the same time, it is incumbent on you to refute him. It is a grave charge.’

‘And too true to be upset, is it not, patron?’ remarked Cestus coarsely. ‘Your lips are glib enough as ever, but your false, cowardly heart is shrivelled within you, at this moment, for fear, I know right well.’

‘Silence, vagabond!’ cried Tiberius; ‘Afer, you have been taken unawares it is true; but, as you declare yourself innocent, you need feel no concern on the score of this charge.’

‘I do not know,’ replied Afer scornfully; ‘too often the innocent suffer – especially, when it is in the interest and inclination of some one that they should be the scapegoat. My worthy uncle lost his grandchild, and now resolves to replace her at all hazards. By a perfectly natural hallucination, he persuades himself that he sees her in the person of the potter’s girl; whatever consequences follow matters nothing to him.’

‘There shall be no suffering of the innocent, or of any one, in this sad matter, except by the pangs of self-accusing conscience,’ said Fabricius; ‘it remains with yourself to disprove the charge or not. If you do not, you know as well as I what judgment will be meted out to you, though you still walk at liberty. I am satisfied, for my part, with the recovery of my child; deal with the rest, which concerns you, as you will.’

‘You are too liberal and slack of dealing, noble Fabricius,’ said Tiberius: ‘it would be better for all concerned to unravel the matter completely.’

‘It touches my nephew’s honour – I leave it in his hands,’ replied Fabricius.

‘Be it so. But yet a word or two more, Afer,’ observed Tiberius; ‘turn to this ruffian of the Subura once more. He has given a very minute description of an alleged acquaintance with you lasting over many years. Is it possible that you do not know him?’

‘No – save for a lying scoundrel,’ returned Afer; ‘but of what avail is my word?’

‘He must then be a scoundrel of exceptional ingenuity and imagination. What say you to this, Suburan?’

‘Why, it is easy enough for him to say that in this place,’ replied Cestus, with a laugh; ‘but in the city he would not dare. He is but plunging himself deeper into the mud when he denies me. It is not a simple thing to throw off altogether a friendship of eighteen years!’

‘Friendship! – execrable villain,’ hissed the knight.

‘As you please, patron; you were always fertile in pretty names,’ retorted the other, shrugging his shoulders.

‘It must be just as easy for you to prove the existence of eighteen years’ connection,’ said Tiberius.

‘Ay, in the city, where plenty of people could be found to help me; but here – stop! will you send for his slave, a Greek lad named Erotion?’

Afer started. These unlooked-for words shot a thrill of terror to his heart and roused him to desperation.

‘He shall not come,’ he cried fiercely. ‘You will terrify him into bearing false witness against me. You are banded against me. I claim a suitable delay, until I can reach Rome, to gather evidence against this conspiracy.’

‘You are unreasonably moved, Afer; we may as well listen to what your slave has now to say as to wait longer. It cannot make any possible difference to you, whether he speak the truth now or then,’ remarked Caesar grimly. ‘Bring the slave hither, if he be in the palace.’

Zeno knew that he was close at hand and went to fetch him. In the few moments’ interval the strained attention of the company relaxed into a low murmur of conversation. Caesar sat with his cheek on his hand and his eyes fixed on no one in particular. The Prefect stole round to the side of his friend Afer and whispered, ‘What is all this, Afer?’

‘You have heard, like me, for the first time, Prefect,’ replied the other, ‘the conspiracy of a rogue.’

‘A clever rogue, by Hercules,’ observed the other, and at that moment Zeno re-entered with the young Greek Erotion.

‘Come hither into the midst,’ said Caesar.

Erotion, with a look of mingled astonishment and alarm, cast an uneasy glance around, whilst bethinking himself of any misdeed which was about to be visited upon him. He came forward into the middle and betrayed unmistakable surprise at seeing Cestus. His master’s eyes were, moreover, fixed on him with a peculiar, meaning expression which he failed to interpret, and which tended to further embarrass him.