“Then order Narcissus to wait in the cubiculum,[39] and do you come with me.”
Phaeton breathed once more. He obeyed with the swiftness of the wind.
The Emperor passed the hours till supper-time in one of the vast pleasaunces on the top of Mons Janiculus, and to Phaeton was vouchsafed the coveted honor of entertaining the ruler of the world, while the rest of the suite stood aside in reverent silence. Domitian was remarkably gracious to-day. He condescended to pinch the boy’s rosy cheeks, and invited him to share the breakfast, which was served in a garden-house with every conceivable luxury. Then Phaeton must sing to him, and tell him once more about his mother, the beautiful, heart-broken Judith, who had been brought to Rome as a young girl from her home in Palestine, and had never ceased weeping till her large, flashing eyes were dim and blind. The boy knew how to talk, sometimes gaily, sometimes sadly—of the holy citadel of Jerusalem[40] which, to him, included all that was sacred on earth—of the horrors of the siege—the Temple of Solomon—the hoary cedars of Lebanon. Then he would relate some reminiscence of his own experience—of the first time he threw the discus on the Field of Mars, and attracted the notice of Parthenius—of the pride and awe with which he had, for the first time, entered the imperial apartments—his delight at Caesar’s approbation, when he returned from an excursion to Albanum.
As he listened to this simple childlike prattle, Domitian was moved to a guileless feeling of affection, which he had long forgotten.
“Tell me, Phaeton,” he said, stroking the boy’s long curls, “if base villains were to attempt your master’s life, or try to hurt him, you would stand by him?”
“So far as I was able, my lord,” said the boy heartily. “But who would dare to commit so monstrous a crime?”
“No one, Phaeton, by the gods! I only asked you to try your love for me.”
When he was weary of Phaeton’s chatter, Caesar had his bearers to carry him about in the gardens for a while, and at last back to the palace—almost exactly at the hour when the assembled Fathers were coming down from the Capitoline, after passing the decree against the Christians. He remained in his room till he went to table, and at the meal he was lively, almost excited, though he eat but little, while, on the other hand, he drank full draughts of Falernian unmixed with water.
When the coena was over, he retired to his private business-room. There he rushed up and down the room in loud and vehement soliloquy, fighting the air like a gladiator and exclaiming wildly: “Come on—only come on, you villains! my good sword shall cleave your skulls.” Then he took to catching flies, as he had been wont to do as a boy,[41] impaling them on his writing-stylus.
“Through and through!” he exclaimed in a tone of triumph. “Have I got you now, traitors? Aye, writhe and wriggle—like mad things! you shall not escape me now, till Tartarus yawns to receive your souls.”