Herodias | Page 5

thick tress of rippling black hair hung
over her shoulder and hid itself in her bosom; her nostrils, a little too
large for beauty, quivered with triumph, and her face was alight with
joy. She gently shook the tetrarch's shoulder, and exclaimed exultantly:

"Caesar is our friend! Agrippa has been imprisoned!"
"Who told thee that?"
"I know it!" she replied, adding: "It was because he coveted the crown
of Caligula."
While living upon the charity of Antipas and Herodias, Agrippa had
intrigued to become king, a title for which the tetrarch was as eager as
he. But if this news were true, no more was to be feared from Agrippa's
scheming.
"The dungeons of Tiberias are hard to open, and sometimes life itself is
uncertain within their depths," said Herodias, with grim significance.
Antipas understood her; and, although she was Agrippa's sister, her
atrocious insinuation seemed entirely justifiable to the tetrarch. Murder
and outrage were to be expected in the management of political
intrigues; they were a part of the fatal inheritance of royal houses; and
in the family of Herodias nothing was more common.
Then she rapidly unfolded to the tetrarch the secrets of her recent
undertakings, telling him how many men had been bribed, what letters
had been intercepted, and the number of spies stationed at the city gates.
She did not hesitate even to tell him of her success in an attempt to
befool and seduce Eutyches the denunciator.
"And why should I not?" she said; "it cost me nothing. For thee, my
lord, have I not done more than that? Did I not even abandon my
child?"
After her divorce from Philip, she had indeed left her daughter in Rome,
hoping that, as the wife of the tetrarch, she might bear other children.
Until that moment she had never spoken to Antipas of her daughter. He
asked himself the reason for this sudden display of tenderness.
During their brief conversation several attendants had come out upon
the balcony; one slave brought a quantity of large, soft cushions, and

arranged them in a kind of temporary couch upon the floor behind his
mistress. Herodias sank upon them, and turning her face away from
Antipas, seemed to be weeping silently. After a few moments she dried
her eyes, declared that she would dream no more, and that she was, in
reality, perfectly happy. She reminded Antipas of their former long
delightful interviews in the atrium; their meetings at the baths; their
walks along the Sacred Way, and the sweet evening rendezvous at the
villa, among the flowery groves, listening to the murmur of splashing
fountains, within sight of the Roman Campagna. Her glances were as
tender as in former days; she drew near to him, leaned against his
breast and caressed him fondly.
But he repelled her soft advances. The love she sought to rekindle had
died long ago. He thought instead of all his misfortunes, and of the
twelve long years during which the war had continued. Protracted
anxiety had visibly aged the tetrarch. His shoulders were bent beneath
his violet-bordered toga; his whitening locks were long and mingled
with his beard, and the sunlight revealed many lines upon his brow, as
well as upon that of Herodias. After the tetrarch's repulse of his wife's
tender overtures, the pair gazed morosely at each other.
The mountain paths began to show signs of life. Shepherds were
driving their flocks to pasture; children urged heavy-laden donkeys
along the roads; while grooms belonging to the palace led the horses to
the river to drink. The wayfarers descending from the heights on the
farther side of Machaerus disappeared behind the castle; others
ascended from the valleys, and after arriving at the palace deposited
their burdens in the courtyard. Many of these were purveyors to the
tetrarch; others were the servants of his expected guests, arriving in
advance of their masters.
Suddenly, at the foot of the terrace on the left, an Essene appeared; he
wore a white robe, his feet were bare, and his demeanour indicated that
he was a follower of the Stoics. Mannaeus instantly rushed towards the
stranger, drawing the cutlass that he wore upon his hip.
"Kill him!" cried Herodias.

"Do not touch him!" the tetrarch commanded.
The two men stood motionless for an instant, then they descended the
terrace, both taking a different direction, although they kept their eyes
fixed upon each other.
"I know that man," said Herodias, after they had disappeared. "His
name is Phanuel, and he will try to seek out Iaokanann, since thou wert
so foolish as to allow him to live."
Antipas said that the man might some day be useful to them. His
attacks upon Jerusalem would gain them the allegiance of the rest of
the Jews.
"No," said Herodias, "the Jews will accept