'I cannot reason with her to that extent, Nicomachus,' replied the Empress. 'I know not the grounds of the common faith, any more than those of Christianity. I only know that I wish Aurelia was not a Christian. Will you, Nicomachus, reason with her? I remember your logic of old.'
'Alas, princess, I can engage in no such task! Where I have no faith myself, I should in vain attempt to plant it in others. How, either, can I desire that any mind should remain an hour longer oppressed by the childish and abominable superstitions which prevail in Rome? I cannot but congratulate the excellent Aurelia, so far as the question of truth is concerned, that in the place of the infinite stupidities of the common religion, she has received the, at least, pure and reasonable doctrines of the Christians. You cannot surely, princess, desire her re-conversion?'
'Only for her own sake, for the sake of her safety, comfort, happiness.'
'But in her judgment these are best and only secured where she now is. How thinks Mucapor?'
'As I believe,' answered Livia, 'he cares not in the matter, save for her happiness. He will not wish that she should have any faith except such as she herself wishes. I have urged him to use his power to constrain her, but he loves liberty himself too dearly, he says, to put force upon another.'
'That is right and noble,' I said; 'it is what I should have looked for from Mucapor.'
'In good sooth, Nicomachus, I believe you still take me but for what I was in Palmyra. Who am I?'
'From a princess you have become an Empress, Empress of Rome, that I fully understand, and I trust never to be wanting in the demeanor that best becomes a subject; but you are still Livia, the daughter of Zenobia, and to her I feel I can never fear to speak with sincerity.'
'How omnipotent, Nicomachus, are simplicity and truth! They subdue me when I most would not. They have conquered me in Aurelia and now in you. Well, well, Aurelia then must take the full weight of her uncle's wrath, which is not light.'
At this moment Aurelian himself entered, accompanied by Fronto. Livia, at the same time, arose and withdrew, not caring, I thought, to meet the eyes of that basilisk, who, with the cunning of a priest, she saw to be usurping a power over Aurelian which belonged of right to her. I was about also to withdraw, but the Emperor constraining me, as he often does, I remained, although holding the priest in still greater abhorrence, I believe, than Livia herself.