She removed a stray lock of hair from her snow white brow, while her eyes burnt into those of Crescentius, like two orbs of living fire.
"Your ears did not belie you, Stephania," the Senator said at last. "I said you are the one—the only one."
With these words he took her hands in his and attempted to draw her down beside him, but she tore them from his grasp, while her face alternately paled and flushed.
"Nay," she spoke with cutting irony, "the Senator of Rome is a model husband. He disdains the dagger and poison phial, instead he barters his wife. You have an admirable code of morality, my lord! 'Tis a pity I do not share your views, else the fiend might teach me how to profit by your suggestion."
Crescentius did not interrupt the flow of her indignation, but his face betrayed a keenness of anguish which did not escape Stephania's penetrating gaze. She approached him and laying her hands on his shoulders bade him look her in the eye.
"How could you say this to me?" she spoke in softer, yet reproachful tones. "How could you? Has it come to the pass where Rome can but be saved by the arts of a wanton? If so, then let Rome perish,—and we ourselves be buried under her ruins."
Her eyes reflected her noble, undaunted spirit and never had Stephania appeared more beautiful to the Senator, her husband.
"Your words are the seal of loyalty upon your soul, Stephania," Crescentius replied. "Think you, I would cast away my jewel, cast it before these barbarians? But you do not understand. I will be more plain. It was not that part you were to assume."
Stephania resumed her seat by his side. Her bosom heaved and her eyes peered dimly through a mist of tears.
"Of all the hosts who crossed the Alps with him," Crescentius spoke with a voice, unsteady at first, but gradually gaining the strength of his own convictions, "none shares the emperor's dreams, none his hopes of reconstruction. An embassy from the Palatinate is even now on the way, to demand his return.—Not he! But there is one, the twin of his mind and soul—Gregory the Pontiff, who will soon have his hands full with a refractory Conclave, and will not be able to succour his friend in the realization of his fantastic dreams. He must be encouraged,—his watchfulness beguiled until we are strong enough to strike the final blow. Only an intellect equal to his own dares assail the task. He must be led by a firm hand, by a hand which he trusts—but by a hand never forgetful of its purpose, a hand closed to bribery of chattel or soul. He must be ruled by a mind that grasps all the strange excrescences of his own diseased brain. Let him build up his fantastic dream-empire, while Rome rallies her forces for a final reckoning, then let the mirage dissolve. This is the part I had assigned to you. I can entrust it to none else. Our hopes hang upon the fulfilment. Thus, his hosts dissatisfied, the electors muttering beyond the Alps, the Romans awakening to their own disgrace, the king at odds with his leaders and himself, the pontiff menaced by the hostile Cardinals, there is one hope left to us, to crush the invaders—our last. If it miscarries,—there will not be gibbets enough in the Campagna for the heads that will swing."