CHAPTER X
"That the world through Him might be saved."—St. John iii. 17.
Taurus Antinor had bidden farewell to his host, and to the other guests and then departed.
Not another word had been spoken on the subject of the Cæsar or of his probable successor. The conspirators, somewhat sobered, had allowed the praefect to go without attempting further effort to gain him to their cause. They had had their answer. Though many of them did not quite understand the full depth of its meaning, yet were they satisfied that it was final. They bade him farewell quietly and without enmity; somehow the thought of their murderous plan had momentarily fled from their mind, and the quarrel between Hortensius Martius and the praefect of Rome seemed to have been the most important event of the day.
Taurus Antinor emerged alone from the peristyle of Caius Nepos' house. An army of slaves belonging to the various guests were hanging about the vestibule, talking and laughing amongst themselves and feasting on the debris from the patricians' table, brought out to them by servitors from within; some forty litters encumbered the floor, but Antinor, paying no heed to these, passed through the crowd of jabbering men and women and made his way across to the steps which led upwards to the street.
The day was done, had been done long ago; already the canopy of the stars was stretched over the sleeping city, and far away to the east, beyond the gilded roof of Augustus' palace, the waning moon, radiant and serene, outlined the carvings on every temple with a thin band of gold and put patches of luminous sapphires and emeralds on the bronze figures that crowned the Capitol.
Taurus Antinor paused awhile, enjoying the restfulness of the night; from his broad chest came a long-drawn breath of voluptuous delight at the exquisite sweetness of the air. How far away now seemed that long, luxurious room, with its stained cloths and crumpled cushions, with the low tables groaning under the debris of past repasts and the rows of couches luring to sensuous repose. For the moment even the wranglings of Caius Nepos' guests seemed remote, their selfish aims and their lying tongues. Here, beneath the stars, there was stillness and peace.
A gentle breeze from over the distant hills blew on the dreamer's forehead and eased the wild throbbings of his temples; from somewhere near tiny petals of heliotrope, chased by the breeze, brought sweet-scented powder to his nostrils.
He looked around him, gazing with wondering eyes on the mighty city sleeping upon her seven hills, on the gorgeous palaces of Tiberius and Caligula and the squalid huts far away on the Aventine Hill, on the mighty temples with their roofs of gold and the yawning arena down below, desolate and silent now, but where on the morrow men and beasts would tear one another to pieces to make holiday for the masters of the world.