to feed. It was an honest creature,
that ape; the only creature in the palace that would not rub its head
in the dust before the Augusta. Ah! now I remember, it always hated
Constantine, for when he was a child he used to tease it with a stick,
getting beyond the length of its chain and striking it. But one day, as
he passed too near, it caught him and buffeted him on the cheek and tore
out some of his hair. He wanted to kill it then, but I forbade him. Yet
he has never forgotten it, he who never does forget anything he hates,
and that is why he sent for the poor beast."

"The Augusta will remember that the Augustus did not know that the figs
were poisoned."

"The Augusta is sure that the Augustus knew well enough that those figs
were poisoned, at any rate from the moment that I dashed one of them
from your lips, Olaf. Well, I have made a bitterer enemy than before,
that's all. They say that by Nature's rule mother and child must love
each other, but it is a lie. I tell you it's a lie. From the time he was
tiny I hated that boy, though not half as much as he has hated me. You
are thinking to yourself that this is because our ambitions clash like
meeting swords, and that from them spring these fires of hate. It is not
so. The hate is native to our hearts, and will only end when one of us
lies dead at the other's hand."

"Terrible words, Augusta."

"Yes, but true. Truth is always terrible--in Byzantium. Olaf, take those
drugged fruits and set them in the drawer of yonder table; lock it and
guard the key, lest they should poison other honest animals."

I obeyed and returned to my station.

She looked at me and said:

"I grow weary of the sight of you standing there like a statue of the
Roman Mars, with your sword half hid beneath your cloak; and, what's
more, I hate this hall; it reeks of Constantine and his drink and lies.
Oh! he's vile, and for my sins God has made me his mother, unless,
indeed, he was changed at birth, as I've been told, though I could never
prove it. Give me your hand and help me to rise. So, I thank you. Now
follow me. We'll sit a while in my private chamber, where alone I can be
happy, since the Emperor never comes there. Nay, talk not of duty;
you have no guards to set or change to-night. Follow me; I have secret
business of which I would talk with you."

So she went and I followed through doors that opened mysteriously at
our approach and shut mysteriously behind us, till I found myself i