Read "The Robe" by Lloyd C. Douglas online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
When the hard-riding couriers brought the report to Capri that Gaius was dead, the Emperor--in the firm opinion of old Julia--was much too ill to be confronted with such shocking news. That, of course, was nonsense, as the Empress well knew; for her son had long been Tiberius's favourite aversion, and these tidings, far from doing the sick old man any damage, might have temporarily revived him.
But, assuming that the tragic death of a Prince Regent should be viewed as an event too calamitous to be announced at the bedside of a seriously ailing Emperor, everybody conceded that Julia was within her rights in commanding that no mention be made of it to her enfeebled husband, though it was something of an innovation for the Empress to display so much solicitude in his behalf.