The Dumb Wit

Extract

Tiberius was taking exercise in the water-garden. He had dismissed his attendants and given orders that he was not to be disturbed; with bent head and brooding pace he passed and repassed the fountain, finding no solace in its pleasant sound for the unpleasing memories that chafed him. ‘Slaves! born slaves!’ he muttered as he walked. It is a hard fate to love liberty and justice, and to be at once the guardian and the ruin of both. A shout of laughter broke his meditations, and a cry from several voices, ‘Bravo! Do it again.’ Tiberius frowned; but the disturbance ceased before he had decided that it must be stopped. He went on walking, and was once more sunk in troubled cogitation when the noise broke out afresh. Brief as before, it nevertheless put an end this time to all hope of quiet thought: to expect interruption is to be all the while disturbed. Now really angry, for nature and training alike were affronted by this disregard of his command and of his comfort, Tiberius turned towards the sound, not without curiosity, for it came from the audience-chamber, usually deserted at this hour. His rapid entrance was unobserved, so intent was the group of household servants at the other end. It is a rare experience for an emperor to remain unnoticed, and Tiberius found his anger subsiding into ironic amusement as he approached them from behind and no one turned. His great height enabled him to look over their heads and see a young slave mouthing and gesticulating in a manner that struck him as familiar. It was very like—yes, surely it was an imitation in dumb show of the speaker he had last heard that morning in the courts.