The Lion's Brood by Duffield Osborne (best reads of all time TXT) 📕

Yet, though both men and women ate greedily and drank deeply, a gloom seemed to hang over the feast. The Carthaginians, whether influenced by native dignity or by a real or simulated contempt for their hosts, were reserved and silent, while the Capuans seemed, at one moment, forcing themselves into strained merriment, and, at another, cowering before the cold eyes that watched their efforts with scarcely veiled indifference. With fear on the one side and distrust upon the other, the chances for hilarity and good fellowship looked scanty enough, and yet Stenius Ninius was too much a man of the world to yield readily to untoward social conditions.

Clapping his hands, he cried out, as the head butler bowed before him:—

"Now, my good Cappadox, let us have no more of these native vintages. Good though they were, they but serve to cultivate the taste for the wines that cement friendships such as ours. Henceforth pour for us only the Coan, Leucadian, and Thasian, and see that you select those amphorae whose contents are toothless with age."

A rough laugh rolled up from the other table, and the voice of Hannibal-the-Fighter broke out with:—

"It is well said, host. Truly I was wondering if we had been drinking from the famous cellars of Capua. We washed our horses with better wine in the north."

Stenius flushed. Then he smiled.

"And, Cappadox," he went on, in an unruffled voice, "do you send what remains in my cellar of the vintages we have been drinking, to the horse of my worthy guest."

At the giant's discourteous words, Hannibal himself had started from the mood of thought in which he had seemed well-nigh buried. A quick glance shot from his eye, and his brow furrowed. Then the courtly answer of Stenius relieved the situation, and he turned to his host.

"You must pardon rough words to rough soldiers, my friend. We of Carthage have had but slender chances to avail ourselves of Greek culture and urbanity. We are mere merchants and warriors—not men of letters or of social manners."

The hulking savage grew purple and trembled under the rebuke of his chief. Twice he essayed to speak and then discreetly gulped down the words, for Hannibal's face, though calm and courtly, showed a hardening of its lines which meant much to those who knew him.

As for the Campanian, he raised his hands in voluble deprecation of the apology.

Did he not realize that but for soldiers and merchants, letters and social manners would never have come into being? It was the privilege of so brave a warrior as Hannibal-the-Fighter to say what he pleased, and when and where. Ordinary rules were only for little men. Besides, the best of Campanian wines were truly all too poor for heroes whose souls were already attasted to the nectar of the gods.

The suppressed fury and shame of the offender melted away under the balm of these honeyed words, and, laughing loudly but with some constraint, he tossed off to his host a cup of the wine last brought.

And now Hannibal seemed to shake himself loose from the bonds of silence and thought, though his conversation still showed the trend of his mind. He turned to Calavius.

"Thirty thousand foot and four thousand horse form an excellent array, and yet I should imagine that the second city in Italy could do even better—in case of need."

The attention of hosts and guests became tense at once, though Marcia could note that the motives were diverse.

Calavius seemed nervous and flustered.

"There was a time when that was undoubtedly so, my Lord," he said hastily; "but, now, many of our young men have fallen in the wars, and many are serving with the enemy, unable to escape and doubtless in serious danger—"

"Three hundred horsemen," interrupted Hannibal, dryly, "and my spies inform me that they are likely to continue serving Rome—by choice, as would doubtless many of your well-born at home—like this fellow, Magius," and his brow darkened ominously.

The Campanians moved uneasily on the couches.

"Magius is a traitor and will be dealt with in due season," said Stenius. "It is friends and festivities first with us, and enemies and punishments later."

"Yes, Magius shall be dealt with," echoed Hannibal; but the acquiescence brought no relief to his hearers. Why should he feel it necessary to supplement their assurance so significantly? Did not the treaty between Carthage and Capua provide that Capuan laws and magistrates should still govern all Capuans? Why should he speak so markedly of their military power? Did not the treaty expressly state that no Capuan was to be called upon for military duty except by his own rulers?

Calavius had been signalling vigorously to his son, Perolla, who had reclined silent and gloomy, but who now seemed about to speak. Disregarding his father's warning, the young man broke in:—

"It is idle to deny that the Campanian horse serve willingly with Rome and will continue so to serve. As for Decius Magius, there are many good men here who hold with him, but who lack his boldness."

For an instant every one held his breath in terror of the coming outburst, but those whose angry or frightened eyes first ventured to glance toward the captain-general saw his face wreathed in smiles, and his wine cup raised toward the daring speaker.

"Happiness to you, flower of Campanian youth! and know that there are two things that Hannibal prizes most among men: a friend who was once an enemy, and a friend who dares to speak the truth."

Calavius had recovered his composure during this speech.

"I would not have you imagine, my Lord," he began, "but that my son speaks as he believes and in order that you may have full information; yet, he is ill to-day in body and mind, and, even were it not so, I am older than he and know more of men. That Decius Magius has sympathizers, it is vain to deny; but that they are many or influential, I, who know the Capuans, aver is not the case. As for our horsemen, it is easy to see that their safety demands an apparent friendship for Rome. It is not wise for three hundred to revile thirty thousand."

Hannibal had continued to keep his gaze upon Perolla, scarcely listening to his father's words. In the young man's face something of surprise had mingled with his half-defiant, half-moody expression.

"I do not ask of you, my son," pursued the general, "that you whose heart was but lately with our enemies, should love and trust us at once. That were the part of a hypocrite, and I honour you, both for the filial piety that threw down your preference before your father's will, and for the slowness with which your heart follows your act. Grant me but this: that you judge us fairly by our deeds, and if we prove not better friends than Rome, return to them in peace and safety. Meanwhile there is a horse with crimson mane and feet that shall be led from my stable to yours in the morning. Ride him, and remember that Hannibal honours courage, filial obedience, and truth—all in like measure."

Subdued applause from both tables followed these words, but the face of Perolla lost but little of its stubborn hostility. Hannibal turned away, and Calavius and Ninius sought to cover by eager talking the young man's ungracious reception of such signal favour. The faces of the Carthaginians remained for the most part impassive; only their dark eyes seemed to sparkle, either with wine or suppressed passion. Marcia still felt that one pair was trying to look through her, and she was conscious that Silenus, the Sicilian Greek, was making eager and indecorous love to one of the women at the other table. Another of the latter had just ventured on some light badinage with the chief guest, in whose face smiles had chased away all the abstraction of the earlier hours. He answered her as lightly, but with indifference, and turned to Marcia.

"And what says our Roman beauty?" he asked. "She has come boldly and far to see her enemies. Who knows but she has a boon to beg."

Again Marcia noted disturbance under Calavius' smile. He was wondering at the general's knowledge. Then he realized that Mago's report must be its basis, and his face cleared.

"Yes, truly, I have a boon to ask," replied Marcia, fixing her great eyes upon the bearded front, stern through its smiles. "It is that you will spare one house in Italy from ravage and destruction."

"And where may this house be?" he asked in bantering tones. "We shall leave many standing, but this one most surely of all."

"It is upon the brow of the Palatine Hill—" she began, and then a burst of applause gave notice that the compliment had struck home. "It is my father's," she concluded, blushing.

Calavius was in ecstasy over the graceful tact of his prot�g�. No Capuan or Greek could have done better. Hannibal eyed her with a curious expression, half admiring, half doubtful.

"I grant the boon—freely," he said. Then, fixing her with his gaze, he went on, "And when will you claim it?"

"The son of Hamilcar knows best," replied Marcia, casting down her eyes, and again she felt the approval of her host and his friends.

That Hannibal was pleased and flattered was evident, and yet there was a certain reserve in his manner. Possibly he suspected that she wished to provoke an announcement of his plans; perhaps an even deeper insight led him near to a fuller conception of her purpose.

"Yes, it is truly for us to say," he said loudly, glancing around the board; then, turning quickly to Marcia: "I understand that you counselled delay until spring to my brother, Mago. Why?"

So frank a question, so different from all that had been told of the more than Oriental craft of the Carthaginians, and one that went so straight to the motive of her presence, threw Marcia into some confusion. Calavius noticed it, and, fearing lest she might say something to do away with the impression of her former tact, he came to the rescue.

"Surely we shall not insult my Lord Bacchus by a council of war in his presence?" but Hannibal waved his hand toward him and looked fixedly at Marcia.

"Goddesses may speak on all subjects, at all times; and the gods smile."

"That my words," she began, with eyes still cast down, "were deemed worthy to be borne to my Lord, is too much honour. That he should deem them worthy of thought, is beyond the dream of mere woman." Then, glancing up and smiling wistfully into his face, she went on: "Know, that whatever of judgment born of knowledge of the place and the men has come to me, a girl,—that and more is for the service of the great general of Carthage,—the benignant liberator of Italy."

"Why do you advise delay?" asked Hannibal again, and the eyes of Maharbal glittered, as he leaned over from the other table. "There are those who say I have delayed too long already."

"For this," replied Marcia, boldly; "that you may save your soldiers and your allies; that they may lie in rest and luxury, and that, ere springtime, the cities of the Latin Name, yes, truly, and the very rabble of Rome, shall come to you on their knees for leave to bear the horseheads along the Sacred Way, up the Capitoline slope—"

"If in the spring, why not now?"

Maharbal and Hannibal-the-Fighter made a clucking sound of assent; Hasdrubal and the other guests seemed indifferent, but the Capuans were hanging on Marcia's words.

"Because the time is not ripe—" she began.

"Words!" cried her questioner, cutting off her speech; "I asked, why?"

Frightened at his vehemence, but put to it of necessity, she answered:—

"Because there are strifes and bickerings—at Rome—throughout the Latin Name—that must soon bear fruit of civil strife. The nobles grind and hold to their privileges; the commons serve and starve and look to Carthage for aid. How shall these things grow better, while you hold the garden of Italy—while the Greeks of the south and the Samnites and the men of the soil gather behind you on one side, and the Gauls and Etruscans muster in the north? The water is eating at the mole; soon the waves will lash up and sweep it from its foundations."

Hannibal eyed her closely for a moment. Then he said: "There are those at Rome and among the Latin Name who tell me otherwise. They are good men, and they know. Perhaps I have been even too cautious. You are young and beautiful. Hold