No sooner did the former awake, greatly refreshed, than one of her attendants glided into the room, saying that the Emperor’s steward was awaiting admittance to deliver a message. The handsome Greek was brought in, and he handed her the tablets he bore. Plautia opened the missive, and found it to be a scrawl in Caesar’s own hand, desiring her company at breakfast, or luncheon, by whichever term the Roman prandium may be called.
‘His highness honours me,’ she said frigidly; ‘but I am not well, and must be excused.’
‘Does your ladyship wish me to take that message to Caesar?’ said Zeno, with subdued regret in his tone.
She nodded, and swept majestically into her dressing-room, where the mirror gave her the satisfaction of beholding a recovered bloom in her cheeks. She had never been prostrated a day with sickness in her memory. Yet to accept a place of her own free will at the table of her jailer was monstrous—at least so her indignant thoughts ran at that moment.
With recovered mental tone, her feminine curiosity began to indulge itself in a more minute inspection of its surroundings than it had hitherto found inclination for. In a small closet she came upon an array of female vestments. Caesar and Capreae were in general forgotten for a period, amid the rustle of beautiful and costly fabrics. Presently came another message, that Charicles, the Emperor’s physician, was in attendance, and would see her at her convenience. Plautia [pg 295]gave a grim kind of smile, and directed inquiry to be made who had sent the physician, and why. The answer was that it was by command of Caesar himself, who was much concerned to learn of her indisposition. He also said, that if sufficiently recovered, he would expect to see her at the Imperial supper-table.
‘Say to Caesar I am grateful for his thoughtful attention,’ said Plautia; ‘but my illness will not require a physician’s aid, and will amend itself by and by.’
Contained in the rooms was a small library of books, and to these Plautia at last turned her attention, when everything else had yielded its full amusement. She lacked the fanciful and imaginative powers which are enslaved by books. She had no resources, no world within to draw upon, like the solitary dreamer or student, who usually finds his own company the most entertaining. Her temperament was practical and her habits active. The resources of the great city, with its variety and bustle, had never failed to provide occupation to fill her time; but here, cooped in the corner of a house, on an island, the situation was wholly different, and already loomed as a serious matter.
She read for some time, and then was wearied. Her own thoughts had remained passive too long, and began to reassert themselves very actively to the subjection of her author. The book was finally tossed aside, and its reader betook herself to pacing ceaselessly and aimlessly through the rooms, with her hands behind her back and her eyes bent on the floor. She gave full rein to her thoughts, and they sought the deep-worn rut of their former fierce torrent, as naturally as the quivering needle-point seeks the pole. Her brows grew dark and heavy once more. Suddenly she shut herself up alone.
* * * * * * *
There was a brighter gleam in the air when, after a time, she came forth. The small windows, high up, seemed more radiant, and outside, in the peristyle, there was even hazy sunlight. The storm had broken. The place seemed to stifle her. Catching up a cloak she sought the garden. The heavy gale had dropped into a steady, brisk breeze, fresh, bracing, and salt. The low, hurrying pall of gray vapours had [pg 296]melted away, and, far overhead, the clouds were luminous. They were shredding and breaking fast into feathery masses. Here and there already peeped the deep blue of the heavens. The sea still tumbled its foamy billows far below, but, from the great elevation of the villa garden, the agitation was scarcely noticeable. It seemed like a huge plain thickly flecked with snow, across the surface of which moved gleaming halos of radiance shooting down from the sunny rifts overhead.