"Which are they?"
"They speak of Hortensius Martius."
"Oh!"
"And of young Escanes ... also of Philario, my servant."
"Ye gods," she exclaimed, "let your judgments fall upon them."
"And of Taurus Antinor—the praefect of Rome," added the Cæsar, and a savage snarl escaped his lips even when he spoke the name.
"Taurus Antinor!" she exclaimed.
Then half-audibly she murmured to herself, repeating the Cæsar's words:
"They would make a tool of thee!"
She had fallen back, squatting on her heels, her hands clasped before her and her head sunk upon her bosom, bowed with shame and with horror. Her name had been bandied about by traitors, her person been bought and sold as the price of the blackest sacrilege that had ever disgraced the patriciate of Rome.