Drusus had been simply sparring to ward off the real point at issue; like many persons he would not assert his convictions and motives till fairly brought to bay.  But that moment came almost instantly.

“Don’t equivocate! Mehercle!” cried Lentulus, getting thoroughly angry.  “Can’t you speak, except to lie and quibble before my face?  Have you joined the gang Curio is rallying for Caesar?”

Drusus was losing his own patience now.

“Yes!  And we shall shortly see whether the Republic is to be longer ruined by incompetence and corruption!”

“Uncle!  Quintus!” implored Cornelia, forcing herself between them, and casting out of her wide-open eyes on each a look full of distress.  “Don’t contend!  For my sake be friends!”

“For your sake!” raged Lentulus, his florid face growing redder and redder.  “I will take care to keep you out of the clutches of a man who deliberately chooses to associate with all that is base and villanous.  Until your handsome lover throws over connections with Caesar and his fellow-conspirators, let him never ask for your hand!”

“Sir,” burst in Drusus, flushing with passion, “do you dare to set at naught the will of your brother and its express commands?  Dare you withhold from me what is legally my own?”

“Legally?” replied Lentulus, with sharp scorn.  “Don’t use that word to a consul-elect, who has the whole Senate and Pompeius behind him.  Laws are very dangerous tools for a young man to meddle with in a case like this.  You will be wise not to resort to the courts.”

“You defy the law!” thundered Drusus, all the blood of his fighting ancestors tingling in his veins.  “Do you say that to a Livian; to the heir of eight consuls, two censors, a master of the horse, a dictator, and three triumphators?  Shall not he obtain justice?”

“And perhaps,” said Lentulus, sinking into an attitude of irritating coldness, “you will further press your claim on the ground that your mother was a Fabian, and the Fabii claim the sole right to sacrifice to Hercules on the Great Altar[82] in the Cattle-market by the Flaminian Circus, because they are descended from Hercules and Evander.  I think the Cornelian gens can show quite as many death-masks in its atria, and your mock heroics will only stamp you as a very bad tragedian.”

  [82] Ara Maxima.

“Uncle!  Quintus!” implored Cornelia again, the tears beginning to start from her eyes.  “Cease this dreadful quarrel.  Go away until you can talk calmly.”

“Quintus Livius,” shouted Lentulus, dropping the “Drusus,” a part of the name which was omitted in formal address, “you can choose here and now.  Forswear your Caesarian connections, or consider my niece’s betrothal at an end!”