“Much chance I have to snare Titus shut up here away from the warriors of Jerusalem; but if we Herod women must be played as pawns to win kingdoms, let us play pawn for the biggest prize of all—Rome.” The elder woman had placed her elbows on the casement of the window and sank her face in her hands. “If you were not such a little fool of dreams, Niece Bernice, you would never have left Jerusalem. You would have stayed on in the Temple Herod built, paying your vows, if you had to cling to the Altar horns! You were wife of Herod Third; and who did more for the Judeans? Free feasts, free games, you remember Cæsarea; and all because your Lord let the Jews stone James, that zealot of the Nazarene, know you what the populace says? They say their God, whom no one has even seen, slew your husband in his coat of silver mail!” “I thank their God for that,” absently answered the girl Bernice. “Herod Third was too old. You chose your Herod. I was sold to mine.” The other younger woman with the insolent inviting voluptuous lips laughed. “Because you had fallen in love with the little blue-eyed slave, Onesimus, whom Felix and Festus rescued from the robber bands of Galilee.” “That slur sounds not well from you, Sister Drusilla! You, yourself, married freed slave. Have you forgotten Felix was freed slave?” asked the slenderer of the sisters. Drusilla of the voluptuous lips laughed. “No, nor have I forgotten he is the only one of all the Herod husbands who left his wife safe with wealth in times of peril. He rose to be ruler under Rome. . . .” “And drove the Jews to insurrection by his thefts and taxes to give you wealth,” interrupted Bernice.