“Ah-h-h!” sarcastically laughed Sejanus. “Gannon has lied to me! His death was an accident. Your knowledge carries with it its own sentence. Your death will not be by accident. But no! Close confinement will suffice for the present.”
At this announcement, made in the most cold-blooded manner, Gannon’s parents became horror-stricken. Hera convulsively held to Alcmaeon, who tried to soothe her. The father bore this new affliction with more fortitude than he showed at the announcement of his son’s death.
“Where is thy daughter?” asked Sejanus.
“O great Sejanus, she knows nothing!” cried Alcmaeon. “She had not yet arrived home when we left.”
“We will see,” said Sejanus. He called a soldier and gave this order: “Take these prisoners and place them in a cell together, in close confinement. Go.”
Scarcely had they left when he called another soldier, and ordered him to bring to the camp Gannon’s tunic. “With that destroyed,” he said to himself, “there will be no evidence against us.” He rubbed his hands and smiled at the course events were taking. He called for his litter and a small body-guard. Then, sinking back among the luxurious cushions of his litter, he commanded imperiously: “To the Palatine!”
Chapter V
A CROWD of magistrates, proconsuls, priests, Senators, and ambassadors were in the polished-marble council chamber in a sumptuous palace on the Palatine Hill. Seated on a curule chair on a raised platform was a man sixty-two years old. His face was handsome, but disfigured with pimples and plasters. His eyes were large and, like those of a bat, could see in the dark. His lips were thick, puffy, and usually moist and shiny. His stern forehead was so furrowed by a frown that his eyebrows touched. His long hair fell upon and greased his toga. His figure was large and robust, his bearing erect; he held his head stiff and upright. Around his neck, over his imperial tunic, he wore a golden chain studded with jewels. As he sat there he was approached, from time to time, by different men who respectfully bowed and proffered words of salutation. From his demeanor and the manner of those who addressed him it might be inferred that he had no higher rank than that of a consul. Yet the man seated there was feared and hated by every one. He was the most powerful man in the Roman Empire. He was the Emperor, Tiberius!
His early life had been full of disappointment. As step-son to the Divine Augustus he always considered himself worthy of great honors. His aspiring hopes, however, were continually shattered. Augustus, marrying his daughter Julia to his nephew Marcellus, had first adopted Marcellus as his heir. When that unfortunate youth died, Augustus married Julia to Agrippa, and then adopted Julia’s second husband as his heir. Agrippa dying and leaving five children, Augustus then adopted as heirs two older sons of Agrippa. Tiberius was then compelled to divorce his wife Vipsania, and to marry the twice-widowed Julia.
While married to Julia he became so gloomy, sullen, and disappointed that, hating the sight of relations and friends thus forced upon him, he voluntarily exiled himself from Rome and lived alone at Rhodes. At that time he was thirty-seven years old. His actions were so childish that he sulked, and hid himself even from friends who passed through Rhodes on their way to the East. To give an appearance of honorable distinction to the exile, Livia, his mother, succeeded in obtaining the title of lieutenant for him. However, such a lewd and vicious life did he lead at Rhodes that the Rhodians insulted him and hurled down his statues.