Basil gave a nameless shrug.
"She bends men's hearts to her own desires, taking from them their will and soul. The hot passion of love is to her a toy, clasped and unclasped in the pink hollow of her hand."
And, as he spoke, Basil suited the gesture to the word, closing his fingers in the air and again unclosing them.
"As long as she retains the magic of her beauty so long will her sway over the Seven Hills endure," he added after a brief pause.
"What of the woman who paid the penalty of her daring?" Tristan ventured to inquire.
Basil regarded the questioner quizzically.
"There have been many disturbances of late," he spoke after a pause. "Roxana's lust for Theodora's power proved her undoing. Theodora will suffer no rival to threaten her with Marozia's fate."
"I have heard it whispered she is assembling about her men who are ready to go to any extreme," Tristan interposed tentatively, thrown off his guard by Basil's affability of manner.
The latter gave a start, but recovered himself.
"Idle rumors. The Romans must have something to talk about. Odo of Cluny is thundering his denunciations with such fervid eloquence that they cannot but linger in the rabble's mind."