“No one knows more of these things,” he said with a meaning smile, “than yourself, F?nius Rufus. You are very jealous for your Emperor; don’t you think that you can show your gratitude to him by making a confession of your own?”
One would think that the man must have foreseen that, sooner or later, one of the accused would thus attack him. Yet he seemed as utterly unprepared for it as if such a contingency had never occurred to him. He might have flatly denied it; he might have passed over it with a pretence of silent contempt. He did neither. He hesitated, stammered, corrected and contradicted himself, in so manifest a condition of panic that his very appearance was equivalent to a confession.
[289] The example once set, Sc?vinus did not want for followers. Prisoner after prisoner stood up, and gave details so numerous, so minute, so consistent, as to put the fact of the Prefect’s complicity beyond a doubt.
“Seize him,” cried Nero. “To think that this villain has been sitting unsuspected by my side for days!”
A soldier, Cassius by name, a man of gigantic frame and vast strength, stepped forward, seized and bound him.
“And then,” cried one of the prisoners, “C?sar, there is another conspirator among your guards. I charge Subrius Flavius, Tribune of the Pr?torians, with treason.”
Nero started up in terror from his chair. His emotion was not mere terror. He knew the Tribune, knew him as a man of singular courage, and as he had always believed one who had always entertained a strong affection for himself.
“Say, Subrius, I implore you,” he cried, “say that this is not true. I cannot believe that you, too, are among the traitors.”
“Is it likely, C?sar,” replied the Tribune, “that I should league myself with cowards and traitors such as these?”
The defence may have been serious; more probably it was ironical. Anyhow it was soon thrown aside. The witnesses heaped up evidence on evidence, and [290] the Tribune, standing calmly and contemptuously silent, tacitly admitted its truth.
“Tell me, Subrius,” said the Emperor, and there was even a touch of pathos in his voice, “tell me why you have forgotten your oath. You swore to be faithful to me. How is it, brave soldier as you are, that you have leagued yourself with traitors?”
“Listen, C?sar,” cried the Tribune, “and hear the truth if for once only in your life. I conspired against you because I hated you. You had not a more faithful soldier while you deserved to be loved. But when you murdered your mother and your wife, when you became a charioteer, an actor, and an incendiary, then I began to hate you.”
These bold words struck the tyrant like a blow. He grew pale and shook with terror, and could not have been more utterly panic-stricken had the speaker been standing over him with a dagger.
“Away with him!” he cried, when he had recovered his voice; and he was immediately pinioned and dragged away.
His daring had at least one result that a brave man would have desired. Possibly he had calculated upon it. He was not kept in suspense about his fate. A fellow-tribune was ordered to lead him off to instant execution. A pit was dug in the field where he was to suffer. Subrius looked on with unmoved countenance while the work was being done. When the Centurion in charge saluted and reported it [291] as finished Subrius looked at it with a critical eye.
“Too narrow, too shallow!” he said. “You can’t even dig a grave according to regulations.”
“Hold out your head, and don’t flinch,” said the Tribune, who had been charged to administer the fatal blow with his own hand.
“Flinch you as little when you strike,” said Subrius, eying with scorn his pale face and trembling hand.
And indeed it needed a second blow before the head was severed from the body.
“Ah, the villain felt that he was dying!” said Nero, when the Tribune reported and even made a boast of what had happened.
It would be tedious to tell in detail the story of how Nero, his rage redoubled by his fear, pursued the conspirators with an unrelenting severity. Scarcely one escaped, and, strangely enough, some whom by some capricious indulgence he either acquitted or pardoned, put an end to their own lives, unable it would seem, to endure existence under such a master.
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A PLACE OF REFUGE
[292] THE freedman Linus had lost no time in making his way to the mansion of Lateranus. He found everything there in a state of the wildest confusion. The wife and children of the dead man had fled for refuge to the house of a relative, taking with them nothing but what they could carry, and leaving everything else at the mercy of the slaves. These had thoroughly ransacked the house; they had broken into the cellars, where some of the plunderers lay at that moment in a state of hopeless intoxication. Others, of a more prudent type, had carried off whatever valuables they could lay their hands on. All the money and plate, in fact, every scrap of the precious metals that could be discovered, had disappeared. The chambers had been stripped of coverlets, curtains, and hangings. The handles of the doors had been removed, and even some of the best designs in the tessellated pavements had been pulled up. A more deplorable scene of ruin than that presented by the house when the freedman entered it could hardly be imagined.
He found, however, to his great relief, that Pom- [293] ponia and Claudia had not been molested. The soldiers sent to arrest Lateranus had received no mandate about the two women, and had accordingly left them alone. One faithful slave had remained, and had been doing his best to minister to their wants. For these, indeed, there still remained in the house a sufficient supply, though much had been wasted by the pillagers. But the outlook before the two women was gloomy in the extreme. They had no friend or kinsman to whom they could look for help. They could not even hope to remain long forgotten. At present the thoughts of all were engrossed by the examination and discovery of the conspirators. But it could hardly be long before Popp?a would bethink herself of her victims. All the Christian fortitude of Pomponia was wanted to keep up her own courage and to administer comfort to her young companion.
It may be imagined then that the coming of the freedman was welcome in the extreme. He had not been able to reach the house in time to do anything that day. Even after nightfall, as long as the streets were full, it would not be safe to make a move. It was necessary for the party to wait with as much patience as they could exercise, till the quietest period of the twenty-four hours, the time between midnight and dawn.
The place in which Linus hoped to find a refuge for his patroness and her young companion was a [294] spot which was then known only to a few, but which has since attained a world-wide fame, the Catacombs of Rome. The greater part of the vast subterranean region now known by that name did not then exist. But a beginning of the excavations had been made. Already there were chambers which could be used for temporary dwellings, others in which worship could be celebrated, and others, again, in which the remains of the dead could find a final resting-place.
The entrance to the excavations was by a sand-pit which had been long since disused. Happily for the secrecy which it was so essential to maintain, the place had an evil reputation. More than one murder had been committed there in former times, (Footnote: See, in particular, the story told by Cicero in the Oration “Pro Cluentio,” of the murder of a young man who had come up to Rome on a visit from one of the provincial towns.) and every one, therefore, was careful to avoid it.
Linus succeeded in removing the two ladies to their new shelter without attracting any attention. About thirty persons were already assembled there. The bishop or chief presbyter of Rome was not there; he had been called away, it happened, on Church business some time before, but one of his principal colleagues was acting in his stead, and had charge of the little community. He gave the newcomers a hearty welcome, and committed the two women to the special charge of a deaconess, who conducted them to [295] the chamber which was assigned to them, and did her best with the very scanty means at her command to provide for their comfort.
A few hours of rest were exceedingly grateful; but both insisted on attending the service which was held shortly after sunrise in a little chamber set apart for purposes of worship.