CHAPTER XXI.
“——Woman all exceeds
In ardent sanctitude and pious deeds:
And chief in woman charities prevail
That soothe when sorrows or disease assail.
As dropping balm medicinal instils
Health when we pine, her tears alleviate ills;
And the moist emblems of her pity flow
As heaven relented with the watery bow.”
Barret.
For many weary days did Lucia watch with fond fidelity the sick couch of her lover, breathing faithful and earnest prayers for his conversion and recovery. Though unconscious of her presence, her step and voice haunted him like a vision—as something known and loved in other days. Reason at length returned, the light was suffered once more to cheer his eyes, and looking up he beheld its beams shining upon the kneeling form of Lucia Claudia.
Her lover uttered her name, and that but once; words could not express his feelings; to him she seemed alive from the dead; his thought could it have found a voice had said, “God, thou art merciful to me a sinner.”
He gazed long and intensely upon his living, his beloved Lucia; a slight scar upon her throat, half hidden among the glittering tresses of sun-bright hair that shaded her lovely face and bosom, recalled her peril to his mind. How had she escaped the jealous fury of her husband? to what strange intervention of Providence did she owe her preservation? He looked from her to her brother, as if to ask him to narrate the particulars of her escape. Lucia guessed his meaning, and seating herself beside him commenced her tale.
“Adonijah, thou wouldest know the history of my wonderful preservation; listen and adore the mercy that saved me from the consequences of my unhappy husband’s posthumous jealousy. His strange behaviour during our brief interview—his passionate farewell, his abrupt departure, and the terrible import of his last words, filled me with apprehension. Some dark ambitious scheme was working in his brain, while the sounds of distant commotion in the camp denoted that Rome was again about to be plunged into a new revolution.
“There was no one within the house of whom I could ask counsel, for my faithful Cornelia was absent, engaged in her office of deaconess, and if present what arm short of Omnipotence could save me from the cruel love, or rather fierce jealousy, of Nymphidius Sabinus. I resumed my devotions and, in the words of the Psalmist of Israel, ‘gave myself unto prayer.’
“I was yet kneeling when Marcus abruptly entered the chamber with consternation and horror depicted on every stern feature. His looks, his bold intrusion on the privacy of a noble Roman lady, told at once his errand. He came, I knew, to slay me.
“Assuming courage I did not at that moment feel, I demanded the occasion of his coming; he briefly communicated the commands of his lord, and putting a dagger into my hand bade me fall by my own hand rather than by a less noble one.
“I put back the deadly weapon which Christianity and ‘the coming in of a better hope’ forbade me to use, and then, actuated by the feeling of self-preservation inherent in human nature, pleaded earnestly for my life.
“I thought I saw signs of relenting in his eye, but his dread of Nymphidius prevailed over his inclination to save me. He caught me by the hair and raised the dagger to slay me. In humble imitation of my Saviour, I prayed Him to forgive my murderers; this unnerved the assassin’s arm, the blow was given, but the wound was slight. Marcus fell at my feet, and flinging the dagger from him buried his convulsed features in my garments and wept like an infant.
“I passed this interval in silent prayer. At length the freedman raised his head, and, telling me ‘that he would report me as dead to his master,’ staunched the wound in my throat, from which the blood was flowing profusely, and demanded ‘whither he should convey me.’
“I resolved to enter the Arenaria, my husband’s attempt to destroy me justifying the step I was about to take. I told him I would leave the house privately that night. He wrapped me in my veil and pallium, kissed my hand, and left me. I found no difficulty in gaining the asylum I had chosen, as an opening existed leading from the sumptuous palace which had formed my miserable home. The Consul Nymphidius perished that night. He lost the object of his ambitious hopes, and I the grievous chain of my unhappy wedlock. Words would fail me to describe its horrors, or the guilt of that ambitious, licentious man. But from the lion’s mouth the Lord delivered me, leading me forth into green pastures beside the waters of comfort. During the stormy revolutions that have convulsed my native city I have dwelt in peace among the brethren, apart from the vain world and its vainer things. A strong desire to see the effigy of my beloved brother Lucius conducted me to the mausoleum of my ancestors, to which an entrance had been pierced from the Arenaria, where I was found by Julius, who, supposing me to be a spirit, fled from me in horror. He took refuge among the brethren, and was by them persuaded ‘to forsake the unfruitful works of darkness, to serve the living God.’ While listening to the consoling words of Linus, he again caught sight of me, and, still deeming me an inhabitant of the shades below, swooned away.”
“Yes, sweet sister,” rejoined Julius, “it was not till I felt thy warm breath on my cheek, and heard thy dear familiar voice speaking comfort to my guilty soul, that I knew I held my living Lucia in my arms.” He paused, and then turning to Adonijah said, “I, too, have a tale to tell; a sad one over which thy heart will bleed.” The bereaved father then related the death of the young Lucius and his own remorse and despair, beseeching Adonijah, as he concluded his touching narrative, “to forgive the sins of a repentant enemy, and contrite man.”
Adonijah was astonished beyond measure at this change in Julius Claudius. “Could this be the vain, selfish, cruel, licentious Roman who owned no law but his own will, whose guileful features, notwithstanding their feminine beauty, lately expressed nothing but deceit and perfidy?” His very countenance seemed altered, showing humility and deep contrition, as if it were the transcript of his new heart. “Could Christianity be false that brought forth fruits like these?”
Lucia Claudia, wiping the tears from her soft eyes, invited her brother to join her in an act of devout thanksgiving to Him whose mercy had been manifested to Jew and Gentile in their persons; and Adonijah united in the Christian’s prayer with deep fervour, and yet they offered it up in the name and through the mediation of the crucified Jesus!