licately carved wood of the chair, Caius Nepos drew a step or two
nearer: he bent his long back nearly double and sank his voice to an
insinuating whisper.

"It was the Caesar himself, O Augusta," he whispered, "who yesterday,
before all the people, made an oath and declared that thy future lord
and master should succeed to the imperium, so that the descendants of
immortal Augustus should in time become the rulers of Rome."

"But the Caesar is not dead," she said simply.

"He is dead to the people, dead to his guard, dead to Rome!" asserted
the praefect solemnly. "Yesterday the dagger of Escanes was ready to do
the supreme act of retributory justice, and to rid the world of a
maniacal tyrant and Rome of a cruel oppressor; to-day the act was
virtually done by the madman himself when he fled in abject terror from
before the face of his people."

And--as if in direct confirmation of Caius Nepos' solemn words, there
came from far away, rising momentarily above the roar of the tempest,
that ever-persistent monotonous cry:

"Death to the Caesar! Death!" even whilst Jove's thunder overhead gave
forth its majestic echo.

Dea Flavia no longer hid her face in her hand. She sat serene and
dignified, upright and pure as a lily, allowing her thoughts to be
expressed in her blue eyes, letting these ambitious self-seekers see
that she was not deceived by their pretence at loyalty and patriotism.
They gathered closer round her, and she looked now truly a queen,
dignified and serene, her head crowned by the glory of her golden
hair--towering above their stooping forms.

There was a look of contempt in her eyes which they did not choose to
see. They were having their will with her; they had fired her ambition
and roused her enthusiasm, and that was all that these intriguers asked
of this girl, of whom they but desired to make a tool for the carving of
their own selfish ends.

Vaguely the older men wondered on whom the Augusta's choice had fallen,
whilst my lord Hortensius Martius felt the hot blood rush to his cheeks
at the hopes that had once more risen in his heart.

But now Ancyrus, the elder, began to speak and his voice was mellow and
gentle.

"The people have spoken plainly, O Augusta," he said; "wilt set thy
will against the might of the people of Rome? Hath not Jove spoken
clearly too? Think on the events of the past two days! The Caesar's
pronouncement in the Circus, the tumult amongst the people when my lord
Horten