her heart with the remembrance that he had not deigned to press his lips
against her foot.

The man's face and figure haunted her for it was the face and the figure
of one whom she had learnt to hate. Yes! She hated him for his treason
to Caesar, for his allegiance to that rebel from Galilee; she hated every
word which he had spoken in that arrogant, masterful way of his, when he
smiled upon her threats and calmly spoke of immortality. She hated the
voice which perpetually rang in her ear, the voice with which he spoke
of his own soul being in the keeping of God--of One Whose Empire is
mightier than that of Rome.

Yet vaguely still--for she was but a girl--the woman in her was stirred;
the power and desire which exists in every woman's soul to conquer that
which seems furthest from her reach. She hated the man, and yet within
her inmost heart there had sprung the desire to curb and possess his; to
disturb the perfect serenity that dwelt in his deep-set eyes, to kindle
in them a passion which would make of that proud spirit a mere slave to
her will.

There was in her just now nothing but the pagan desire to rule, and to
break a heart if need be, if she could not otherwise subdue it.

Memory had fanned her wrath. She saw him now as she had seen him
yesterday, arrogantly thwarting her will, his bitter tongue lashing her
with irony; and now, as yesterday, the blush of humiliation burned her
cheeks, and her pride and dignity rose up in passionate revolt against
the one man who had ever defied her and who had proudly proclaimed his
allegiance to a man who was not the Caesar.

That allegiance belonged to Caesar and to his might alone; beyond that
there was the House of Caesar, and failing that, nothing but rebellious
treachery. And the troubled look grew deeper in Dea Flavia's face, and
now she buried her hot cheeks in her hands, for the humiliation which
she had endured yesterday from one man seemed to shame her even now.

"I'll break thy will," she murmured, whilst angry tears rose, burning,
to her eyes. "I'll shame thy manhood and never rest until I see thee
crawling--an abject slave--at the feet of Caesar, who shall kick thee in
the face. Caesar and the House of Caesar brook no rivalry in the heart of
a Roman patrician."

Her hands dropped from before her face. She threw back her head, and
looked straight before her into the darkest corner of the room.

"Jesus of Nazareth, he called thee!" she said slowly and as if