There's a language in her eye, her cheek, her lip;
Nay, her foot speaks, her wanton spirits look out
At every joint and motive of her body.
Troilus and Cressida.
About three hours later than the scene in the Campus Martius, which had occurred a little after noon, Catiline was standing richly dressed in a bright saffron[13] robe, something longer than the ordinary tunic, flowered with sprigs of purple, in the inmost chamber of the woman's apartments, in his own heavily mortgaged mansion. His wife, Aurelia Orestilla, sat beside him on a low stool, a woman of the most superb and queenly beauty—for whom it was believed that he had plunged himself into the deepest guilt—and still, although past the prime of Italian womanhood, possessing charms that might well account for the most insane passion.
A slave was listening with watchful and half terrified attention to the injunctions of his lord—for Catiline was an unscrupulous and severe master—and, as he ceased speaking, he made a deep genuflexion and retired.
No sooner had he gone than Catiline turned quickly to the lady, whose lovely face wore some marks of displeasure, and said rather shortly,
"You have not gone to her, my Aurelia. There is no time to lose; the young man will be here soon, and if they meet, ere you have given her the cue, all will be lost."
"I do not like it, my Sergius," said the woman, rising, but making no movement to leave the chamber.
"And why not, I beseech you, madam?" he replied angrily; "or what is there in that which I desire you to tell the girl to do, that you have not done twenty times yourself, and Fulvia, and Sempronia, and half Rome's noblest ladies? Tush! I say, tush! go do it."