CHAPTER X.

A WICKED PLOT.

We have already mentioned the fact that Fausta, the mother of the Emperor Galerius, was a fanatical pagan. The especial object of her regard was the goddess Cybele, who was worshipped in Rome with rites of the most degrading superstition. Fausta was intensely bitter in her hatred of the Christian name, and strenuously endeavoured to incite her son, the Emperor, to persecution. She was especially virulent towards her daughter-in-law, the beautiful Valeria, and sought by every means to embitter the mind of Galerius against her. In this she was strongly abetted, or rather inspired, by Furca, the vicious old priest of Cybele, whose wicked influence over her was very great. This worthy pair, the day after the interview above described, were engaged in a secret conclave or conspiracy against Valeria and the Christians, while the latter was seeking to carry out her benevolent enterprise.

The scene of their interview was the reception-room of Fausta, in the palace of the Emperor Galerius. It was far more sumptuously furnished and decorated than that of the Empress Valeria, and at one end, in a marble niche, stood an ugly image of the goddess Cybele, with her crown of many towers, rudely carved out of olive wood, but quite embrowned, and almost blackened with age. It was bedizened with costly jewels, and was deemed to be of special sanctity. Before it was a small marble altar, on which burned, day and night, a silver censer.

At the moment of which we write, Fausta approached the altar, and kissing her hand to the image--an ancient mode of worship, from which we get the word "adore"--she took some costly Sabean incense from a small gold coffer, and sprinkled it on the glowing coals of the censer. Dense white fumes arose, whose rich aromatic odour filled the large apartment. Fausta had been an Illyrian peasant, and, notwithstanding her embroidered robes and costly jewels, she still exhibited much of the rude peasant character and lack of culture. Her coarse and wrinkled features and swarthy complexion, were all the more striking by their contrast with the snowy mantle, with its gold-embroidered border, which she wore; and her bright black eyes glittered with an expression of deadly malice like those of a serpent. While she stood before the altar, a servant announced that Furca, the arch-priest of Cybele, had obeyed her summons. As the curtain of the door was drawn aside, a little weazened old man, as dark as mahogany, wearing a thick crop of snow white hair, appeared.

"Thanks, good Furca," said Fausta, "I desire your counsel on a matter of much importance to the State, and to the worship of the holy Cybele."

"At your service, your Excellency," said the obsequious priest, who also kissed his hand to the black-faced image, and sprinkled a few grains of incense on the censer.

"Thou knowest how the worship of the Galilean Christus has increased, not only among the common people, the vile plebs, and the still viler slave population, but even among the patricians and nobles. I have evidence that even in this palace, and very near the throne, the execrable superstition is cherished."

"Alas! your Excellency, I fear it is only too true," whined the bigot arch-priest. "Certain it is that neither of the Empresses, Prisca or Valeria, ever take part in the public worship of the gods, as from their lofty station it is their duty to do."

"Yes, and I have reason to believe that there is plotting and conniving between the Empress and the accursed Christian sect."

"Hast any proof of this?" asked the arch-priest, eagerly. "This is a crime against the State."

"The black slave Juba," replied Fausta, "is, as thou knowest, a faithful worshipper of Cybele, and she told me even now, that Adauctus, the Imperial Treasurer, had been only yesterday closeted with the Empress, and plotting to restore to the favour of the Emperor a certain Demetrius, a Christian renegade, who is in hiding for his crimes."

"Oh, ho!" chuckled the priest, with a wicked grin, "my fine lady need not think herself so high and mighty as to be above the reach of the law, or beyond the anger of the insulted gods."

"I would almost give my eyes," hissed through her teeth the revengeful Fausta, "if I could only see that painted doll, Valeria, abased and degraded. She has too long held a sway, of which I, the mother of the Emperor, have been deprived."

"I trust you may not only see it," said Furca, gloating in anticipation over the prospect, "but also see her pale, proud mother, the Empress Prisca, humbled at your feet."

"Accomplish this, good Furca," exclaimed Fausta, with exultation, "and the goddess Cybele shall have such an offering as she never had before."

"We must be wary," said the priest, "or we may ourselves be crushed. They are too powerful to be attacked openly. We must plot against them secretly. I'll be a _furca_ to them indeed," he added, punning upon his own name, which had also the signification of an instrument of punishment, something like a cross; and the conspirators parted with this pledge of mutual hate against their destined victims.