‘Pomponia is welcome,’ she said. ‘She does not often deign to visit the poor Empress. She should have been a vestal virgin, and moved about surrounded by sanctities. But we wicked people have our sorrows too. I was thinking of my boy Rufius. I love him more than anything on earth, and Nero hates to see him, and will not let him visit me. The poor boy might just as well have no mother.’
Pomponia paused before she spoke, and had to gulp down a choking sob. ‘I can sympathise with you, Empress. My son Aulus was a little older than your charming Rufius. He was manly; he was beautiful; he gave promise of all his father’s virtues.’
‘I know, I know,’ said Poppæa, turning away her face, on which rose, in spite of herself, a burning blush. ‘He offended Nero in some way, and he is dead.’
‘He offended him not,’ said Pomponia. ‘How could an innocent lad like my Aulus have been guilty of treason? Let us speak no more of him. There are those for whom death is more merciful than life, and I did not come here to bewail my own bereavements.’
‘I pleaded for your boy, Pomponia—indeed, I did. I deigned to prostrate myself before Nero that he would not injure him, that he would not have him slain. Would you believe that I—I, the Empress,—have fears lest something evil should be done to my young Rufius?’
‘May Heaven protect his youth!’ said Pomponia. ‘If it will be any comfort to you I will see him, and ask him to our palace. My husband is kind to all the young, and will love him for the sake of his own lost boy. And I will take your messages to him.’
‘Thanks, Pomponia, thanks,’ said the Empress. ‘Nowhere could he be better than in your virtuous home. But why have you sought me—you to whom the Palace is justly hateful?’
‘I come,’ answered Pomponia, ‘to plead for your pity. There is not a prison in Rome which is not full of innocent men and women, called Christians. They are charged with having set fire to Rome, and with many other atrocities. Empress, they are innocent! Will you not use your influence for them? If you have ever done evil—forgive me, Poppæa, but I know not the language of falsehood, or of flattery—will you not now try to do a great deed of good?’
‘Your kindness deceives you,’ answered the Empress. ‘From all that I have heard they thoroughly deserve their fate.’
‘Your mind has been poisoned against them by their enemies the Jews. Believe me, Poppæa—for I know them well—their lives are almost the only beautiful lives spent in this wicked city.’