‘To the vaults of the palace,’ answered the official laconically.
‘Know you who I am?’
‘Perfectly well. But I am ordered to place you in the vaults, and I have no alternative but to obey.’
The young prince looked fiercely around, but seeing how useless any resistance would be, he dropped his chin on his breast with a silent stoical resignation which touched Martialis to the heart. Torches were lit and the party descended the steps, and went along an underground passage. The keeper of the palace halted before a narrow, heavily-barred door, and unlocked it. It needed a strong pressure to cause it to move on its hinges, and, as it did so, a heavy, damp, noisome atmosphere puffed forth, which caused the torches to flicker and splutter. They went in. The interior was hewn out of the rock; spacious enough, but humid, chill, and horrible—a perfect tomb. The trickling moisture, which bedewed the walls, glistened icily through the gloom in the light of the torches, and the floor was damp and sticky, and traced with the slimy tracks of creeping things. There was a pallet and a stool, and the slaves placed some eatables thereon. Martialis felt sick at heart and shuddered.
‘You are sure you are right in bringing him to this fearful place—a place unfit for a beast to rest in?’ he whispered to the gaoler.
‘It is the best of all the vaults,’ was the brief reply.
The unhappy prince looked round, in a stupefied way, and shivered. The change was frightful, from the sunny skies and balmy air of the lovely sea-girt Capreae. Martialis stepped up to him. ‘I must leave you, Drusus,’ he said; ‘I am sorely grieved to quit you in such a lodging—it must be by error, [pg 98]and if so, I will not fail to do my best to have it rectified at once.’
‘Thanks, friend,’ said the unfortunate, looking with fixed eyes; ‘bid them send their murderers speedily!’
Without another word he went to the pallet and sat down, and buried his face in his hands in mute despair.
One of the torches was fixed into an iron socket on the wall, and the order was given to withdraw. Full of distress, Martialis took a second light from the hand of its bearer, and extinguishing it, he laid it on the little stool, so that it might succeed the other when needed. Then taking his large military cloak from his shoulders, he gently dropped it over the unhappy prisoner’s form and turned away. The dungeon was then vacated and locked, and the Centurion rushed, as hastily as he was able, with a heart full of painful feelings, up into the fresh pure air and sweet moonlight outside.