Quo Vadis, Henryk Sienkiewicz [fox in socks read aloud .txt] 📗

your wives; the old libertine is coming!” But Nero’s monstrous vanity could not endure the least blame or criticism; meanwhile in the throng, amid shouts of applause were heard cries of “Ahenobarbus, Ahenobarbus! Where hast thou put thy flaming beard? Dost thou fear that Rome might catch fire from it?” And those who cried out in that fashion knew not that their jest concealed a dreadful prophecy.

These voices did not anger Caesar overmuch, since he did not wear a beard, for long before he had devoted it in a golden cylinder to Jupiter Capitolinus. But other persons, hidden behind piles of stones and the corners of temples, shouted: “Matricide! Nero! Orestes! Alcmaeon!” and still others: “Where is Octavia?” “Surrender the purple!” At Poppaea, who came directly after him, they shouted, “Flava coma!!”13 with which name they indicated a streetwalker. Caesar’s musical ear caught these exclamations also, and he raised the polished emerald to his eyes as if to see and remember those who uttered them. While looking thus, his glance rested on the Apostle standing on the stone.

For a while those two men looked at each other. It occurred to no one in that brilliant retinue, and to no one in that immense throng, that at that moment two powers of the earth were looking at each other, one of which would vanish quickly as a bloody dream, and the other, dressed in simple garments, would seize in eternal possession the world and the city.

Meanwhile Caesar had passed; and immediately after him eight Africans bore a magnificent litter, in which sat Poppaea, who was detested by the people. Arrayed, as was Nero, in amethyst color, with a thick application of cosmetics on her face, immovable, thoughtful, indifferent, she looked like some beautiful and wicked divinity carried in procession. In her wake followed a whole court of servants, male and female, next a line of wagons bearing materials of dress and use. The sun had sunk sensibly from midday when the passage of Augustians began⁠—a brilliant glittering line gleaming like an endless serpent. The indolent Petronius, greeted kindly by the multitude, had given command to bear him and his godlike slave in a litter. Tigellinus went in a chariot drawn by ponies ornamented with white and purple feathers, They saw him as he rose in the chariot repeatedly, and stretched his neck to see if Caesar was preparing to give him the sign to go his chariot. Among others the crowd greeted Licinianus with applause, Vitellius with laughter, Vatinius with hissing. Towards Licinus and Lecanius the consuls they were indifferent, but Tullius Senecio they loved, it was unknown why, and Vestinius received applause.

The court was innumerable. It seemed that all that was richest, most brilliant and noted in Rome, was migrating to Antium. Nero never traveled otherwise than with thousands of vehicles; the society which accompanied him almost always exceeded the number of soldiers in a legion.14 Hence Domitius Afer appeared, and the decrepit Lucius Saturninus; and Vespasian, who had not gone yet on his expedition to Judea, from which he returned for the crown of Caesar, and his sons, and young Nerva, and Lucan, and Annius Gallo, and Quintianus, and a multitude of women renowned for wealth, beauty, luxury, and vice.

The eyes of the multitude were turned to the harness, the chariots, the horses, the strange livery of the servants, made up of all peoples of the earth. In that procession of pride and grandeur one hardly knew what to look at; and not only the eye, but the mind, was dazzled by such gleaming of gold, purple, and violet, by the flashing of precious stones, the glitter of brocade, pearls, and ivory. It seemed that the very rays of the sun were dissolving in that abyss of brilliancy. And though wretched people were not lacking in that throng, people with sunken stomachs, and with hunger in their eyes, that spectacle inflamed not only their desire of enjoyment and their envy, but filled them with delight and pride, because it gave a feeling of the might and invincibility of Rome, to which the world contributed, and before which the world knelt. Indeed there was not on earth anyone who ventured to think that that power would not endure through all ages, and outlive all nations, or that there was anything in existence that had strength to oppose it.

Vinicius, riding at the end of the retinue, sprang out of his chariot at sight of the Apostle and Lygia, whom he had not expected to see, and, greeting them with a radiant face, spoke with hurried voice, like a man who has no time to spare⁠—“Hast thou come? I know not how to thank thee, O Lygia! God could not have sent me a better omen. I greet thee even while taking farewell, but not farewell for a long time. On the road I shall dispose relays of horses, and every free day I shall come to thee till I get leave to return.⁠—Farewell!”

“Farewell, Marcus!” answered Lygia; then she added in a lower voice: “May Christ go with thee, and open thy soul to Paul’s word.”

He was glad at heart that she was concerned about his becoming a Christian soon; hence he answered⁠—

“Ocelle mi! let it be as thou sayest. Paul prefers to travel with my people, but he is with me, and will be to me a companion and master. Draw aside thy veil, my delight, let me see thee before my journey. Why art thou thus hidden?”

She raised the veil, and showed him her bright face and her wonderfully smiling eyes, inquiring⁠—

“Is the veil bad?”

And her smile had in it a little of maiden opposition; but Vinicius, while looking at her with delight, answered⁠—

“Bad for my eyes, which till death would look on thee only.”

Then he turned to Ursus and said⁠—

“Ursus, guard her as the sight in thy eye, for she is my domina as well as thine.”

Seizing