Britannicus was intelligent beyond his years, and thoughts like these chased each other through his mind as he made his way with slow and painful steps to the rooms of his sister. For an instant the thought of a rebellion flashed across his mind, but it was at once rejected. What could he do? He was but a friendless boy. He felt as if he had heard the sentence of early death; as if his innocence were nothing to such gods as those whom his childhood had been taught to name; as if the burden of an intolerable world were altogether too heavy for him to understand or to bear. And yet he was not unsupported by some vague hope in the dim, half-explored regions of that new gospel of which he now had heard.
To Octavia the visits of her brother were almost the only happiness left. As he entered she dismissed the slaves, for she saw at a glance that some profound emotion had swept over his mind, and longed to give him consolation.
In their forlornness the brother and sister always tried to spare each other any needless pang. Octavia had never hinted to Britannicus that Nero’s base hand had often been lifted to strike her. She did not tell him that on that morning he had seized her by the hair, and in the frenzy of his rage had almost strangled her. Nor would he tell her about the infamous attack on their father’s memory which he had seen on Nero’s table. He little dreamt that she knew of it already, nay, even that, with coarse malice, Nero had shown it to her, and read passages aloud in her tortured hearing on purpose to humiliate and trouble her. Still less would he reveal the threat which seemed to give fresh significance to the feline gleam which he had caught a few days before in the eyes of the horrible Locusta.
Yet by secret intuition each of them divined something of what was in the heart of the other.
When Britannicus entered he found his sister gazing with a sad smile at a gold coin of the island of Teos, which lay on the palm of her hand.
‘What amuses you in that coin?’ he asked.
‘Look at it,’ she said, pointing to the inscription Θεὰν Ὀκταβίαν—‘the goddess Octavia.’[51] ‘I was thinking, Britannicus, that if the other goddesses are as little happy as I am, I should prefer to be a mortal!’
Her brother smiled too, but remained silent. He dreaded to deepen her sorrow.
‘Have you nothing to tell me, Britannicus?’ she asked. ‘What is it which makes you so much sadder than your wont?’
‘Nothing that I can tell you,’ he answered. ‘But oh, Octavia, what thoughts strike you when you look round upon this Palace and society? Is there no such thing as virtue?’ he asked impetuously. ‘The Romans used to honour it. Who cares for virtue now, except one or two philosophers ? and—’