_ BOOK III. PAWNS AND PLAYERS
CHAPTER I
The lord Eudemius, covered with tawny leopard skins, lay stretched on a couch of carven ebony in the library of the villa, of which the windows overlooked the great central courtyard. He was a tall man, spare, with black, sombre eyes, a high nose, and a wiry black beard, close clipped. His hands, long and white and nervous, held a scroll which he kept slowly unwinding and letting roll together again. His face was remarkable for nothing save its complete impassivity; devoid of all expression, it was merely a mask behind which the man kept locked his real self and thoughts. A dish of fruit stood on a stand at his elbow. With him in the room sat Livinius, the father of Marius, making notes with a stylus on a tablet of ivory coated with wax. The face of Livinius was grave, yet eager. He began to speak presently, as though continuing a conversation which had gone before.
"Rome has often needed gold, and has wrung it from the people mercilessly; but I tell you, Eudemius, that her need was never greater than in this hour. Ay, and not gold alone she must have, but brains to plan for her, hands to work for her, blood to be spilled for her. You, yourself, friend, have been soldier, senator, statesman. You know, as I know, and as every Roman in his soul must know, that the core of the trouble lies in the fact that she hath gathered in more than her two hands could hold. I would not see her other than she is,--mistress of the world; but I would first see her in a position to maintain that title in the face of all challenge. And she is not in such position. Outwardly, she hath all show of might, of force invincible and impregnable. But behind this, what is there? The weakness of dissension, where there should be solidarity; division of interests, where nothing can save but union; rottenness, where there should be wholesomeness and vigor. This is not treason I speak, but truth. We have served her in field and forum, you and I; we have offered our blood on her altars; we shall both carry the marks of her service until we die. And she hath paid us well. Now I am worn out, useless, and cast aside; she has taken all she would from me, even my son. But you, old friend, have still what she needs to offer. She needs gold; but more than that, she needs one, powerful as you are powerful, to come forward and point to more timid ones the way. When she enters her own once more, she will repay your loan with interest, for that hath ever been Rome's way. I tell you, Rome in these days is like a sinking ship, from which the rats scurry in swarms, to stand aside and wait to see if there be prospect of a safe return. Here, overseas, you get but an echo of the truth. Every day the call goes out for more troops, and more."
Eudemius nodded thoughtfully.
"So the Third Legion is to be recalled from Gaul to Rome. It is what may be expected, but I had not thought so soon. Their plans have been kept well secret. AEtius will soon not have men enough for himself, not to speak of sending over men to our assistance. I suppose your son goes with them? It must be all of ten years since I saw him last."
"He hath changed," the father answered quietly. "Yes, he goes, and I go with him. Come thou with us, friend! What has Rome done to thee that thou shouldst not answer to her need? Now, if ever, is the time when her sons must rally to her, for with all her faults--and she hath many--she is still the mother of them all. I know well that it was within her walls that thy trouble fell upon thee; but was she to blame for that?"
Eudemius's dark face never changed from its graven inscrutability, but his thin hands clutched the scroll tighter and let it fall. Livinius eyed him tenderly.
"Is not the old wound healing, even yet?" he asked with great gentleness. For a moment silence fell. Then Eudemius, stooping from the couch to pick up the fallen roll, said in his hard and even voice, as though he discussed matters of small moment and everyday concern:
"Healing? Nay, how should it heal when each day fresh salt is rubbed into it? Take a look at it now, if you will, for hereafter we'll let it bide and rankle as it must. Tell me; have not your eyes seen changes, mental as well as physical, concerning which your lips have not questioned?"
"Changes? in you?" said Livinius, dropping into the other's more distant tone. "Ay, that is true, and my heart aches to see them. That is another reason why I urge your return to Rome. New scenes, new faces--your life is broken, yet a broken pitcher may be mended."
"True," Eudemius admitted evenly. "But who expects it to hold water again? Is it not rather placed upon the shelf and forgotten--if, indeed, it be not flung upon the rubbish-heap?"
"But think of this--" Livinius persisted. Eudemius broke in.
"Ay, I have thought of this and that, and this is all it comes to!" he said harshly. "That when I am gone, my name, blazoned in the annals of Rome before great Caesar was, must dwindle out to nothing with a weak girl. It came to me great, unstained, heavy with memories of soldiers, heroes, statesmen, who had borne it worthily and left it clean for their sons and their sons' sons. I made it the name of wealth as well as of greatness; I thought to hand it down to my sons and my sons' sons, as the fires of Vesta are handed down from one generation to the next. A son I prayed for--what any sodden carter is judged worthy to beget; a male child to uprear in the traditions of his house, to add, an he might, his share to the glory of it. A son to serve Rome as his fathers served. And what was born to me? A puling fool, not worthy even to breed her kind into the world. Were she blessed with wit, she might mate with one worthy of her blood and keep her name thus from complete extinction. As it is--what man would have her to bear him mindless brats? Who would become sire to a race of idiots?"
Livinius scratched the wax of his tablet absently, and rubbed his finger over the mark.
"I have wondered often why you never married again," he remarked, tentatively. "It is fifteen years since Constantia's death; surely in that time you might have found a woman to become the mother of your sons."
"True, I might," Eudemius admitted, coolly. "But those fifteen years ago, through mine own folly and hatred of life after that double blow of her death and knowledge of the girl's condition,--for it was a blow, Livinius, since I was not then the wooden image of to-day,--there fell on me the judgment of the gods for such rebellion as mine." He turned his sombre eyes full on Livinius. "Would you believe, to see me as I sit here, that mine is a body racked by the tortures of the damned, drained of the very sap of life by disease that eats into every nerve and leaves it raw and quivering, yet that only numbs when its fury is spent, and will not kill? That time after time, when its throes are on me, I have turned craven and begged Claudius for a potion to end it all?" He laughed shortly, with no sound of merriment. "I marry again--a rotten hulk fit only for carrion!"
Livinius listened, shocked.
"Oh, my dear!" he exclaimed in honest sympathy, "is it indeed thus with thee? And I had thought of thee entering the harbor of thy rest, wealthy, honored, reconciled, perhaps, to what the gods in their wisdom had ordained for thee, to end thy days in quiet and content. For fifteen years, thou sayest. Man, how hast thou lived to tell it?"
Eudemius smiled, a smile which began at his lips and ended there, leaving his bitter eyes unlightened.
"Ay, fifteen years--and yet not so bad as that!" he said shortly. "Or it would have been well over with me by now. But I have known from the first what lay ahead. I won it from Claudius,--poor fool, how he trembled to tell me!--knew that each attack must be more severe than the one before; that each day the disease would stride forward a slow inch, no more, and no human skill might advance it or hold it back." His harsh voice sank a note lower. "At such times, when that grip closes upon me, I know not what I do. Rather, I know, yet am powerless to act otherwise. I tell thee, Livinius, I have had slaves flogged, ay, tortured, before my eyes, to see if by chance I might find suffering greater than mine own. And if they died, I have had tortured those who let them die, for it is not death I want, but what I have found to be worse than death. Judge then if I were not better out of the world! Yet the only way of release open to me I will not take, since I have not yet lost courage enough to brand myself a coward. I have told Claudius, on pain of death for disobedience, that no matter how I cry to him for peace, he shall pay no heed. Strange, is it not, that in this house the only happy thing is the cause of all the sorrow that hath entered it? And yet--perhaps it is not so strange. She is but the cause; on others fall the effects, ... and in their wisdom the gods have ordered that only effects shall count in their scheme of things."
He put a hand over Livinius's hand, held it a moment, and let it go. For the first time he fell into the intimacy of the other's speech.
"Thank thee, old friend, for thy sympathy. It is not often that the gall of my bitterness overflows, for I have learned the wisdom of the Stoic at first hand. But I can claim scant sympathy here,--and would not if I could,--where men call me the Torturer behind my back and cringe like curs before my face. I am hard and cruel and calloused to the bone; yet were I not thus, in the name of the high gods, what should I be? A thing lower than man, who can be lower than the beasts; from which gods and men--ay, and beasts themselves--would turn in loathing. Thou art my childhood's friend; thy sympathy hath been sweet to me, and I've bared my heart to thee. I have said: 'The world runs thus and so with me; were it in my power, I'd have it otherhow. As it is, no good will come of its discussion, so let there be an end to it, now and for all time.'"
A quick step sounded on the marble floor; the curtains at the entrance parted, and Marius came in. He went clad in spotless white, which oddly accentuated his bulk and made his swarthiness darker by contrast. He stopped short at sight of the two apparently in earnest conversation.
"Pardon!" he said easily. "I was told that I should find my father here, but I intrude."
"Not at all!" Eudemius answered. "We had finished our talk, and it was over time we were brought back from the memory of other days."
Livinius smiled at his son as the latter sat down on the wide low ledge of the window, and his genial eyes were full of pride. Eudemius caught the look, and his own eyes darkened, even though the mask of his face never changed. This indeed was a son of whom one might be proud--a son such as he himself should have had but for the mockery of the gods; a son strong of mind and body, able to hold his own against all men, to assume the burdens that one by one slipped from his father's shoulders. There was hint of dissipation in the clear-cut face; there was more than a trace of headstrong will, which might easily enough turn to sheer brutality against whoever crossed it. There was hardness, and small tenderness, in the firm jaw and the black keen eyes; but what Roman father could not condone such things as these? For to Roman eyes, all this went to spell strength; and Romans worshipped strength as Athenians worshipped beauty. And Marius was strong, so that Eudemius, who was strong also, with the most unbreakable strength of all, and could appreciate mere physical vigor the more since his own had gone from him, looked at him and envied the father of him with bitterness.
"To-day I go on to Londinium," Marius said, gazing out into the sun-flecked courtyard. "Will you wait here, father, for me? To-morrow I shall return, or next day at most--the business will not take long." He turned to Eudemius with an explanation. "There is trouble about one of the transports which are assigned to my cohort for our return to Gaul. She has been discovered unseaworthy and in need of repairs, and may not be able to start with the rest of the fleet. This is doubly inconvenient, as there is small prospect of securing a vessel to take her place, and our orders are to sail for Gaul with as little delay as possible. So much misunderstanding and confusion has resulted, that I have been sent to report personally what are the chances for a start."
"That is too bad," Eudemius said. He was looking at Marius at the moment, and Marius was looking beyond him into the court. Eudemius saw that all at once his face changed slightly, and his eyes awoke to a faint, curious interest. Eudemius knew that nothing in his words could have aroused this, and waited. Then he understood that Marius was watching some one outside in the courtyard; some one whose approach he could gauge by following the man's glance. The some one came to the door that opened on the court, and stopped there, and Eudemius glanced aside and saw Varia on the threshold. At the same instant Marius rose.
She wore robes that flowed and yet were clinging, of faintest green, like the young shining leaves of springtime; and her skin glowed and her lips were crimson, and her hair was loose and tumbled. She held a ball in her hands, and stood in the doorway, hesitating, like a child who does not know whether or not it will be welcomed, and yet would like to enter and find out what was going on. In her pose there was a quaint and tender dignity, in odd contrast with her rumpled hair and the childish plaything in her hands. Eudemius looked at her; and for a single instant the veil of prejudice was lifted from his eyes, and he saw that, in spite of all, this child of his was fair,--as fair as the dear dead woman who had given her to him and lived to know what she had done. For that instant hope rose in him; he shot a glance at Marius and read the dawning admiration in his eyes; perhaps, after all, in some not too distant time, there might be--Then he realized the futility of such hopes, that had wakened and died so many times before. Marius did not know the truth. When he did know--He saw that Varia did not look at either of the others, but straight at him, and he spoke to her.
"Come hither, child!"
She came, docile, and stood near the foot of his couch. With her there seemed to enter a breath of pure fragrance, as of wind blowing softly among unspoiled, wild flowers of the country-side, of all things young and innocent and holy. Livinius's face softened as he looked at her. She waited, watching her father, expecting nothing. Always he had given her nothing to expect, neither unkindness nor affection. Eudemius looked at Livinius; from him to Marius, where he stood in the window, silent, dominant even in his silence.
"And this is mine!" he said, with a motion of his hand toward Varia. Livinius, alone understanding all that his words and tone implied, gave him a glance of mute reproach. He took Varia's hand, as she stood near him, and patted it.
"I am glad to know thee, dear child," he said gently. "Thy father I have known these many years, but thou wert a little baby when I saw thee last. Perhaps he has not told thee that I am a friend of his, and this is my son."
And Varia, for the first time, looked into Marius's face, and smiled, saying nothing at all. She sat on the edge of the couch, the ball in her lap.
"Where have you been, child?" Eudemius asked.
"In the garden, playing ball. I am going to play again," she answered, and never thought to wonder why he frowned.
But Marius came over to the couch.
"Will you let me play also?" he asked, with a faint note of amusement in his voice. "Perhaps I can show you a game you do not know, which soldiers play in camp. When they have no ball, like yours, they take a lump of bread, that is round, and very hard, and will keep for months without spoiling, and they play with that."
Varia jumped up.
"I should like that!" she said eagerly. "I cannot show you any game, for I know none that are interesting; but I can learn yours!"
The two went out into the courtyard, side by side. Livinius said, in his gentle voice:
"She is a dear child."
And Eudemius answered:
"She is a bad bargain dearly bought," and turned his face away from the window.
Varia wearied of the new game shortly, and sat down beside the fountain to rest, with a frank intimation that her companion might go back to the house. This he showed no intention of doing, but threw himself on the grass beside her, and set himself the task of making her talk. He studied her curiously; he had seen much of many women in many lands, but none who were quite like her. Her utter simplicity was baffling; artificial himself, brought up in a civilization which was artificial, he could not get it out of his mind that it was not a pose. Very soon he got her mental calibre; with it got also certain surprises. She was all-innocent; yet, at times, when she sat with hands clasping her knees and looked past him, without speech or motion, as regardless of him as though he had not been there, he caught a hint in her eyes of something he could not read. It was as though she struggled to recall a memory of something gone by,--something sweet yet unholy which she did not understand, would not ask about, and could not forget. And, at other times, in the midst of her childish prattle, she would say what would make him glance at her strangely, in a voice like hers, yet whose subtle intonations were not like hers. Also, he had not found many women who were at times as honestly regardless of him as though he had not been there. With all her contrarieties he found her merry, full of a primitive joy of life, touched only at moments with a haunting mystery which to his mind but added to her charm. Her laughter bubbled over as water from a spring; she was careless, thought-free, light-hearted. For it is only those who remember nothing that regret nothing; and Varia had neither remembrance nor what it brings.
When he mounted and rode for Londinium that afternoon it was with the full determination to despatch his business as quickly as might be and return. He told himself amusedly that he had been singed too often, by too many flames, to care for the feeble light of one broken lamp. This was quite true. But also he acknowledged that when other lamps were wanting, a broken one might answer for an hour. _