‘And could you not say so before?’ she asked, with an indescribable sneer which stung him to the quick.
‘Not until you yourself had uttered the name, should I have dared to mention what might prove disagreeable,’ he replied derisively.
‘Proceed, then, and without fear.’
‘It will require but few words. You arrived in a mysterious manner; and, it is said, you came hither of your own [pg 307]accord, because you could no longer endure the absence of the handsome Centurion Martialis from Rome!’
‘Psa! You are too ridiculous.’
She laughed outright, but the knight, though he could not but admire her self-possession, could hardly fail to detect the false ring on her tones.
‘And this is the portentous secret you drag forth so mysteriously,’ she cried; ‘this is what you have heard in the wine-shops and on the Marina! Worthy, idle Capreans! And you, Titus Afer—subtle Titus Afer—to what an empty, pitiful condition of mind, has the sleepy stagnation of this pile of rocks amid the sea brought you, that such an idle fable should so occupy your thoughts as to relate it seriously and solemnly to me.’
‘I admit that one’s faculties are apt to rust amid the sluggish tranquillity of this place,’ replied Afer, with a sigh of charming softness. ‘The whole thing is absurd, but for the extraordinary fact, that the wonderful story is not the production of the gossips themselves. Instead of being born in the village below, it has flowed from the villa above—from headquarters itself.’
As a matter of fact, the details of Plautia’s romantic adventure had spread no further than the reader is already aware of, but the unscrupulous knight knew the power of such a statement, false as it was, and, therefore, made it without hesitation. To have given the rumour on the authority of the simple islanders themselves, was to have rendered it of no weight with her; but to boldly state that it proceeded from the villa, was at once to load her with the maddening suspicion that she had been betrayed. Thus to include the man he hated, by one master-stroke, was a worthy revenge, and he perpetrated the falsehood with an utter recklessness of discovery. He was prepared to exult over an explosion of wrath, or, better still, to gloat over an exhibition of shame and abasement, which would have left him master of the field, in a triumph to last as long as life. But to have reckoned on any mood of weakness, he perceived, at once, was vain. His quiet words fell on her ears with an unexpectedness that struck her dumb for a few moments.
Martialis must have betrayed her—had probably told all [pg 308]to his comrades, as an excellent joke and boast; and for all she knew, she had, perhaps, been the sport and object of secret laughter to every one around. Her pride boiled—her head whirled. Her eyes dilated and her robust frame trembled as if seized with ague.