Domitia

Domitia was received by the wife of L. Ælius Lamia, who had adopted Domitia’s husband. He was a quiet man, who had no ambition, had taken no offices, and had passed his time in taming birds. He was the son of a better known man, who had been a friend of Horace.

The old woman, gentle in manner, took Domitia by the hand and led her into the tablinum, where was old Lamia, a cripple through gout, and he kissed the girl, patted her hands and spoke an affectionate welcome.

“Claudia and I,” said he, “were childless and so we adopted Lucius. He has been a good son to us, and this is a happy day to all three, – to him who has secured the sweetest flower of Rome, and to Claudia and me who obtain so good a daughter. But, ah! we are old and have our humors, I, with my gout, am liable to be peevish. You must bear with our infirmities. You will have a worthy husband, one cut out of the old rock of which were the ancient Romans, and not of the Tiberine mud of which the present generation are moulded.”

“Come now,” said the old woman, “the guests are about to depart, bid them farewell.”

Then she led the young girl back into the atrium.

There stood the Chaldæan, dark, stern, ominous.

Domitia in exuberant joy smiled at him, and said:

“Elymas! You see my happiness. Isis has for once been in error – we, my Lamia and I, are united, and there have been no hands thrust forth to part us.”

“My lady,” said the astrologer, “the day is not yet over.”

“And the auguries were all propitious.”

“The promise of the augurs may not jump with thy desire,” he replied.

She had no time for more words, as her hand was caught by L. Ælius Lamia, who drew her aside into the lararium or chapel.

“My dearest,” he said, “this is a day of trial to thee – but we shall be left undisturbed shortly. The guests depart and the riot will cease.”

She looked at him, with eyes that brimmed with tears, and a sob relieved her heart, as she cast herself on his breast and said: —

“Quoniam tu Caius, ego Caia.”

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE END OF THE DAY

A rumor, none knew from whom it arose, spread rapidly in whispers, sending a quiver of alarm, distress, pity, through the entire wedding party, reaching last of all him most concerned.

None dared breathe in his ear what all feared; but none would separate till it was surely ascertained whether what was surmised was a fact or not.

The slaves knew it and looked wistfully at Lamia.

He was engaged in making trifling presents to the many guests and well-wishers, moving from one to another, attended by slaves with trays piled up with gifts.

Eboracus burst on him, through the throng, forgetting, in his agitation and fear, the diffidence that belonged to his position.

“Sir! Where is the mistress?”

Lamia, without looking at him, or desisting from what he was about, answered:

“Within, being freed from her veil and bridal ornaments.”

“Sir! Lucius! she has been stolen from you! she has been carried away.”

Lamia stood as one petrified.

“How dare you utter such a jest?”

“It is no jest – she has been conveyed hence. She is not in your house.”

Without another word, Lamia flew into the portion of the house to which Domitia had retired.

There all was in confusion. The female slaves were either struck down with terror, or crying out that they were not to blame.

“Where is she?” asked Lamia, hardly realizing that there was actual loss, thinking this was some frolic of his young companions, who on such occasions allowed themselves great licence.

To add to the confusion, a tame magpie with clipped wing, belonging to the gouty old Lamia, got in the way of every one, and screamed when run over; and the elder man roared out reproach and brandished his crutch when the life of his pet was endangered.

Claudia, like a pious woman, had rushed to the lararium to supplicate the assistance of the Gods, especially of Lamius, son of Hercules and Omphale, the reputed half-divine ancestor of the family.

Domitia had disappeared. – How? – none could say. She had been spirited away, one said in this manner, another said in that. One held it as his opinion that she had been carried off by some disbanded Vitellian soldiers who were said to lurk about the suburbs of Rome and commit depredations. Some thought that in maiden shyness she had fled home; some whispered that the Gods had translated her; others that a former lover had suborned the servants to admit him, and that he had conveyed her from her husband’s house to his own.

But in what direction had she been taken? There again opinions differed, and tongues gave conflicting accounts. One had seen a litter hurried down the Clivus Scauri. One declared that he had seen a girl running in the direction of Nero’s lake, and suggested that this was Domitia who had gone thither to destroy herself. One had noticed suspicious-looking men wrapped in military cloaks lounging about, and these had disappeared – he had even seen the backs of some near the Porta Metrovia. Then one cried out: —

“What else can be expected when such an ill-omened bird is kept in the house, as a magpie?”

Not until all guests, visitors, had been excluded from the house, could anything be learned with certainty, and that was little. During the afternoon, shortly before the arrival of the procession, several male and female slaves had arrived under the direction of a Chaldæan soothsayer, who announced that he had been sent along with them to the house of the bridegroom by the bride’s mother, the Lady Duilia, and that they formed a portion of Domitia’s attendance, who had been associated with her in her former home, and would be about her person in her new quarters. No suspicion had been roused, and as the Magian spoke with authority, and gave directions, which it was presumed he was commissioned to do, and as old Lamia was crippled with gout and moreover indisposed to attend to such matters, and the old lady was simple to childishness, these strangers were suffered to do much what they pleased; and on the bride retiring to be divested of the flame colored veil, her wreath and other ornaments, had been allowed to take possession of her.

What happened further they did not know. In the excitement of the arrival of visitors nothing had been observed till some of the household servants remarked that the servants of the family of Duilia had left, – that there had been a bustle in the garden court, and that a litter had departed, borne by men who ran under their load. But even then no notion that the bride had been carried off was entertained. For some time no suspicion of mischief arose. When the slaves became aware that their new mistress was no longer in the house, there was first some surprise entertained that she was not seen, then a notion that she might be unwell or over-tired – but the first word that suggested that she had been conveyed away came from without the house, from a guest who inquired casually what lady had left the house, in a litter, borne by trotting porters. Lamia, in violent agitation, at once hurried to the house whence Domitia had come, to ask for an explanation. There he learned nothing satisfactory. No servants had been sent beforehand. Domitia had taken with her two female slaves, but they had attended her in the procession. The sorcerer, it was true, had disappeared and had not returned.

Lamia was obliged to return home, without his anxiety being in any way removed.

On reaching his palace on the Cœlian, he learned something further. In the room in which Domitia had been divested of her bridal ornaments, which lay scattered in disorder, was a crystal cup that contained the dregs of wine, and this wine was drugged with a powerful narcotic. Of this the slave who acted as house-surgeon and physician was certain. He had tasted it and detected the presence of an opiate. Nothing further could be learned, neither whence came the strange slaves nor whither they had gone.

In the mean time a party surrounding a closed litter had passed through the Porta Capena, and was hurrying along the Appian Way.

Directly the city was left, a tall man who directed the convoy called a halt; – then approaching the litter, he drew back the curtains, and said: —

“Asleep! Two of you take her up, lift her, set her on her feet and rouse her.”

He was obeyed and a helpless body was removed, sustained between two stout slaves, and made to stand on the causeway.

“Shake her,” said the director, who was none other than the Chaldæan. “If she sleep on, she will never wake. Roused and made to walk she must be. We need fear no pursuit. I have left those behind who will spread a false rumor, and send such as think she has been carried away along the wrong road. Make her walk.”

The helpless girl – it was Domitia – staggered with drowsiness and stumbled.

“Let me sleep,” she murmured.

“It must not be, lady. To let you sleep is to consign you to death. You must be constrained to walk.”

“Let me sleep!” she fretfully said.