“After you came back safe our decision seemed justified. I talked with Vocco and learned that nothing had occurred to render your exposure likely, except your encounter with Calvaster. As we heard nothing from Calvaster we felt entirely successful. It turns out that he was only biding his time. He has formally accused you before the College of Pontiffs, alleging in general your long-continued familiarity with Vocco, and, in particular, your having been outside of Rome after midnight in Vocco’s company.”
“Whew,” Brinnaria exclaimed, “this is indeed serious! I feel myself strangling or starving in a vaulted cell. What am I to do?”
“See Commodus first of all,” said Lutorius.
In the short interval since her former audience, those traits of which he had previously shown the merest traces had rapidly developed in Commodus into fixed characteristics. He had become what he remained until his end, an odd mingling of loutish, peevish school-boy, easy-going, self-indulgent athlete and superstitious, suspicious despot.
“To begin with,” he said, “I want you to understand that I like you, that I haven’t forgotten that you rescued the retiarius, whopped Bambilio and behaved like a trump when Father tested you. I’m for you. Your colts are the cream of Italian stud-farms. You are a wonderful woman, all round. But, as a Vestal, you have your weak points. I remember Father’s instructions about you and I have all that in mind. Besides, I know that I, as Chief Pontiff, have the right to make my own decision about any such matter and to brush aside anybody else’s opinion and anybody else’s interpretation of the evidence. Also my impulse is to make use of my prerogative, dismiss the accusation against you, reiterate Father’s warning to Calvaster and get the whole thing off my mind. I don’t like Calvaster and I don’t value him an atom. They say he’s indispensable, but if he irritates me ever so little more I’ll dispense with him and I’ll wager the Republic will get on without him. You see that I am strong on your side and almost on the point of deciding in your favor.
“But I hesitate. This case of yours worries me more than anything that has come up since I took over the Principiate. I cannot make up my mind.