"Welcome, most lovely Fulvia," exclaimed the host, gliding softly into the room. "By Mars! the most favored of immortals! You must have stolen Aphrodite's cestus! Saw you her ever look so beautiful, my Paullus? You do well to put those sapphires in your hair, for they wax pale and dim besides the richer azure of your eyes; and the dull gold in which they are enchased sets off the sparkling splendor of your tresses. What, Fulvia, know you not young Arvina—one of the great Caecilii? By Hercules! my Curius, he won the best of the quinquertium from such competitors as Victor and Aristius Fuscus, and ran twelve stadii, with the heaviest breast-plate and shield in the armory, quicker than it has been performed since the days of Licinius Celer. I prithee, know, and cherish him, my friends, for I would have him one of us. In truth I would, my Paullus."

The flattering words of the tempter, and the more fascinating smiles and glances of the bewitching siren, were not thrown away on the young noble; and these, with the soft perfumed atmosphere, the splendidly voluptuous furniture of the saloon, and the delicious music, which was floating all the while upon his ears from the blended instruments and voices of unseen minstrels, conspired to plunge his senses into a species of effeminate and luxurious languor, which suited well the ulterior views of Catiline.

"One thing alone has occurred," resumed the host, after some moments spent in light jests and trivial conversation, "to decrease our pleasure: Cethegus was to have dined with us to-day, and Decius Brutus, with his inimitable wife Sempronia. But they have disappointed us; and, save Aurelia only, and our poor little Lucia, there will be none but ourselves to eat my Umbrian boar."

"Have you a boar, my Sergius?" exclaimed Curius, eagerly, who was addicted to the pleasures of the table, almost as much as the charms of women. "By Pan, the God of Hunters! we are in luck to-day!"

"But wherefore comes not Sempronia?" inquired Fulvia, not very much displeased by the absence of a rival beauty.

"Brutus is called away, it appears, suddenly to Tarentum upon business; and she"—

"Prefers entertaining our Cethegus, alone in her own house, I fancy," interrupted Fulvia.

"Exactly so," replied Catiline, with a smile of meaning.

"Happy Cethegus," said Arvina.

"Do you think her so handsome?" asked Fulvia, favoring him with one of her most melting glances.

"The handsomest woman," he replied, "with but one exception, I ever had the luck to look upon."

"Indeed!—and pray, who is the exception?" asked the lady, very tartly.

There happened to be lying on a marble slab, near to the place where they were standing, a small round mirror of highly polished steel, set in a frame of tortoiseshell and gold. Paullus had noticed it before she spoke; and taking it up without a moment's pause, he raised it to her face.

"Look!" he said, "look into that, and blush at your question."

"Prettily said, my Paullus; thy wit is as fleet as thy foot is speedy," said the conspirator.

"Flatterer!" whispered the lady, evidently much delighted; and then, in a lower voice she added, "Do you indeed think so?"

"Else may I never hope."

But at this moment the curtains were drawn aside, and Orestilla entered from the gallery of the peristyle, accompanied by her daughter Lucia.

The latter was a girl of about eighteen years old, and of appearance so remarkable, that she must not be passed unnoticed. In person she was extremely tall and slender, and at first sight you would have supposed her thin; until the wavy outlines of the loose robe of plain white linen which she wore, undulating at every movement of her form, displayed the exquisite fulness of her swelling bust, and the voluptuous roundness of all her lower limbs. Her arms, which were bare to the shoulders, where her gown was fastened by two studs of gold, were quite unadorned, by any gem or bracelet, and although beautifully moulded, were rather slender than full.

Her face did not at first sight strike you more than her person, as being beautiful; for it was singularly still and inexpressive when at rest—although all the features were fine and classically regular—and was almost unnaturally pale and hueless. The mouth only, had any thing of warmth, or color, or expression; and what expression there was, was not pleasing, for although soft and winning, it was sensual to the last degree.

Her manner, however, contradicted this; for she slided into the circle, with downcast eyes, the long dark silky lashes only visible in relief against the marble paleness of her cheek, as if she were ashamed to raise them from the ground; her whole air being that of a girl oppressed with overwhelming bashfulness, to an extent almost painful.

"Why, what is this, Aurelia," exclaimed Catiline, as if he were angry, although in truth the whole thing was carefully preconcerted. "Wherefore is Lucia thus strangely clad? Is it, I pray you, in scorn of our noble guests, that she wears only this plain morning stola?"

"Pardon her, I beseech you, good my Sergius," answered his wife, with a painfully simulated smile; "you know how over-timid she is and bashful; she had determined not to appear at dinner, had I not laid my commands on her. Her very hair, you see, is not braided."

"Ha! this is ill done, my girl Lucia," answered Catiline. "What will my young friend, Arvina, think of you, who comes hither to-day, for the first time? For Curius and our lovely Fulvia, I care not so much, seeing they know your whims; but I am vexed, indeed, that Paullus should behold you thus in disarray, with your hair thus knotted like a slave girl's, on your neck."

"Like a Dryad's, rather, or shy Oread's of Diana's train—beautiful hair!" replied the youth, whose attention had been called to the girl by this conversation; and who, having thought her at first unattractive rather than otherwise, had now discovered the rare beauties of her lythe and slender figure, and detected, as he thought, a world of passion in her serpent-like and sinuous motions.

She raised her eyes to meet his slowly, as he spoke; gazed into them for one moment, and then, as if ashamed of what she had done, dropped them again instantly; while a bright crimson flush shot like a stream of lava over her pallid face, and neck, and arms; yes, her arms blushed, and her hands to the finger ends! It was but one moment, that those large lustrous orbs looked full into his, swimming in liquid Oriental languor, yet flashing out beams of consuming fire.

Yet Paullus Arvina felt the glance, like an electrical influence, through every nerve and artery of his body, and trembled at its power.

It was a minute before he could collect himself enough to speak to her, for all the rest had moved away a little, and left them standing together; and when he did so, his voice faltered, and his manner was so much agitated, that she must have been blind, indeed, and stupid, not to perceive it.

And Lucia was not blind nor stupid. No! by the God of Love! an universe of wild imaginative intellect, an ocean of strange whirling thoughts, an Etna of fierce and fiery passions, lay buried beneath that calm, bashful, almost awkward manner. Many bad thoughts were there, many unmaidenly imaginings, many ungoverned and most evil passions; but there was also much that was partly good; much that might have been all good, and high and noble, had it been properly directed; but alas! as much pains had been taken to corrupt and deprave that youthful understanding, and to inflame those nascent passions, as are devoted by good parents to developing the former, and repressing the growth of the latter.

As it was, self indulged, and indulged by others, she was a creature of impulse entirely, ill regulated and ungovernable.

Intended from the first to be a tool in his own hands, whenever he might think fit to use her, she had in no case hitherto run counter to the views of Catiline; because, so long as his schemes were agreeable to her inclinations, and favorable to her pleasures, she was quite willing to be his tool; though by no means unconscious of the fact that he meant her to be such.

What might be the result should his wishes cross her own, the arch conspirator had never given himself the pains to enquire; for, like the greater part of voluptuaries, regarding women as mere animals, vastly inferior in mind and intellect to men, he had entirely overlooked her mental qualifications, and fancied her a being of as small moral capacity, as he knew her to be of strong physical organization.

He was mistaken; as wise men often are, and deeply, perhaps fatally.

There was not probably a girl in all Italy, in all the world, who would so implicitly have followed his directions, as long as to do so gratified her passions, and clashed not with her indomitable will, to the sacrifice of all principle, and with the most total disregard of right or wrong, as Lucia Orestilla; but certainly there was not one, who would have resisted commands, threats, violence, more pertinaciously or dauntlessly, than the same Lucia, should her will and his councils ever be set at twain.

While Paullus was yet conversing in an under tone with this strange girl, and becoming every moment more and more fascinated by the whole tone of her remarks, which were free, and even bold, as contrasted with the bashful air and timid glances which accompanied them, the curtains of the Tablinum were drawn apart, and a soft symphony of flutes stealing in from the atrium, announced that the dinner was prepared.

"My Curius," exclaimed Catiline, "I must entreat you to take charge of Fulvia; I had proposed myself that pleasure, intending that you should escort Sempronia, and Decius my own Orestilla; but, as it is, we will each abide by his own lady; and Paullus here will pardon the youth and rawness of my Lucia."

"By heaven! I would wish nothing better," said Curius, taking Fulvia by the hand, and leading her forward. "Should you, Arvina?"

"Not I, indeed," replied Paullus, "if Lucia be content." And he looked to catch her eye, as he took her soft hand in his own, but her face remained cold and pale as marble, and her eye downcast.

As they passed out, however, into the fauces, or passage leading to the dining-room, Catiline added,

"As we are all, I may say, one family and party, I have desired the slaves to spread couches only; the ladies will recline with us, instead of sitting at the board."

At this moment, did Paullus fancy it? or did that beautiful pale girl indeed press his fingers in her own? he could not be mistaken; and yet there was the downcast eye, the immoveable cheek, and the unsmiling aspect of the rosy mouth. But he returned the pressure, and that so significantly, that she at least could not be mistaken; nor was she, for her eye again met his, with that deep amorous languid glance; was bashfully withdrawn; and then met his again, glancing askance through the dark fringed lids, and a quick flashing smile, and a burning blush followed; and in a second's space she was again as cold, as impassive as a marble statue.

They reached the triclinium, a beautiful oblong apartment, gorgeously painted with arabesques of gold and scarlet upon a deep azure ground work. A circular table, covered with a white cloth, bordered with a deep edge of purple and deeper fringe of gold, stood in the centre, and around it three couches, nearly of the same height with the board, each the segment of a circle, the three forming a horse-shoe.

The couches were of the finest rosewood, inlaid with tortoiseshell and ivory and brass, strewed with the richest tapestries, and piled with cushions glowing with splendid needlework. And over all, upheld by richly moulded shafts of Corinthian bronze, was a canopy of Tyrian purple, tasselled and fringed with gold.

The method of reclining at the table was, that the guests should place themselves on the left side, propped partly by the left elbow and partly by a pile of cushions; each couch being made to contain in general three persons, the head of the second coming immediately below the right arm of the first, and the third in like manner; the body of each being placed transversely, so as to allow space for the limbs of the next below in front of him.

The middle place on each couch was esteemed the most honorable; and the middle couch of the three was that assigned to guests of the highest rank, the master of the feast, for the most, occupying the central position on the third or left hand sofa. The slaves stood round the outer circuit of the whole, with the cupbearers; but the carver, and steward, if he might so be termed, occupied that side of the table which was left open to their attendance.

On this occasion, there being but six guests in all, each gentleman assisted the lady under his charge to recline, with her head comfortably elevated, near the centre of the couch; and then took his station behind her, so that, if she leaned back, her head would rest on his bosom, while he was enabled himself to reach the table, and help himself or his fair partner, as need might be, to the delicacies offered in succession.

Curius and Fulvia, he as of senatorial rank, and she as a noble matron, occupied the highest places; Paullus and Lucia reclined on the right hand couch, and Catiline with Orestilla in his bosom, as the phrase ran, on the left.

No sooner were they all placed, and the due libation made of wine, with an offering of salt, to the domestic Gods—a silver group of statues occupying the centre of the board, where we should now place the plateau and epergne, than a louder burst of music ushered in three beautiful female slaves, in succinct tunics, like that seen in the sculptures of Diana, with half the bosom bare, dancing and singing, and carrying garlands in their hands of roses and myrtle, woven with strips of the philyra, or inner bark of the linden tree, which was believed to be a specific against intoxication. Circling around the board, in time to the soft music, they crowned each of the guests, and sprinkled with rich perfumes the garments and the hair of each; and then with more animated and eccentric gestures, as the note of the flute waxed shriller and more piercing, they bounded from the banquet hall, and were succeeded by six boys with silver basins, full of tepid water perfumed with costly essences, and soft embroidered napkins, which they handed to every banqueter to wash the hands before eating.

This done, the music died away into a low faint close, and was silent; and in the hush that followed, an aged slave bore round a mighty flask of Chian wine, diluted with snow water, and replenished the goblets of stained glass, which stood beside each guest; while another dispensed bread from a lordly basket of wrought gilded scroll work.

And now the feast commenced, in earnest; as the first course, consisting of fresh eggs boiled hard, with lettuce, radishes, endive and rockets, olives of Venafrum, anchovies and sardines, and the choicest luxury of the day—hot sausages served upon gridirons of silver, with the rich gravy dripping through the bars upon a sauce of Syrian prunes and pomegranate berries—was placed upon the board.

For a time there was little conversation beyond the ordinary courtesies of the table, and such trifling jests as were suggested by occurrences of the moment. Yet still in the few words that passed from time to time, Paullus continued often to convey his sentiments to Lucia in words of double meaning; keenly marked, it is true, but seemingly unobserved by the wily plotter opposite; and more than once in handing her the goblet, or loading her plate with dainties, he took an opportunity again and again of pressing her not unwilling hand. And still at every pressure he caught that soft momentary glance, was it of love and passion, or of mere coquetry and girlish wantonness, succeeded by the fleeting blush pervading face, neck, arms, and bosom.

Never had Paullus been so wildly fascinated; his heart throbbed and bounded as if it would have burst his breast; his head swam with a sort of pleasurable dizziness; his eyes were dim and suffused; and he scarce knew that he was talking, though he was indeed the life of the whole company, voluble, witty, versatile, and at times eloquent, so far as the topics of the day gave room for eloquence.

And now, to the melody of Lydian lutes, two slaves introduced a huge silver dish, loaded by the vast brawn of the Umbrian boar, garnished with leaves of chervil, and floating in a rich sauce of anchovies, the dregs of Coan wine, white pepper, vinegar, and olives. The carver brandished his knife in graceful and fantastic gestures, proud of his honorable task; and as he plunged it into the savory meat, and the delicious savor rushed up to his nostrils, he laid down the blade, spread out his hands in an ecstacy, and cried aloud, "ye Gods, how glorious!"

"Excellent well, my Glycon," cried Curius, delighted with the expressive pantomine of the well skilled Greek; "smells it so savory?"

"I have carved many a boar from Lucania and from Umbria also; to say nothing of those from the Laurentian marshes, which are bad, seeing that they are fed on reeds only and marsh grass; most noble Curius; and never put I knife into such an one as this. There are two inches on it of pure fat, softer than marrow. He was fed upon holm acorns, I'll be sworn, and sweet chesnuts, and caught in a mild south wind!"

"Fewer words, you scoundrel," exclaimed Catiline, laughing at the fellow's volubility, "and quicker carving, if you wish not to visit the pistrinum. You have set Curius' mouth watering, so that he will be sped with longing, before you have helped Fulvia and your mistress. Fill up, you knaves, fill up; nay! not the Chian now; the Falernian from the Faustian hills, or the Caecuban? Which shall it be, my Curius?"

"The Caecuban, by all the Gods! I hold it the best vintage ever, and yours is curious. Besides, the Falernian is too dry to drink before the meat. Afterward, if, as Glycon says, the boar hath a flavor of the south, it will be excellent, indeed."

"Are as you as constant, Paullus, in your love for the boar, as these other epicures?" cried Fulvia, who, despite the depreciating tone in which she spoke, had sent her own plate for a second slice.

"No! by the Gods! Fulvia," he replied, "I am but a sorry epicure, and I love the boar better in his reedy fen, or his wild thicket on the Umbrian hills, with his eye glaring red in rage, and his tusks white with foam, than girt with condiments and spices upon a golden dish."

"A strange taste," said Curius, "I had for my part rather meet ten on the dining table, than one in the oak woods."

"Commend me to the boar upon the table likewise," said Catiline; "still, with my friend Arvina at my side, and a good boarspear in my hand, I would like well to bide the charge of a tusker! It is rare sport, by Hercules!"

"Wonderful beings you men are," said Fulvia, mincing her words affectedly, "ever in search of danger; ever on the alert to kill; to shed blood, even if it be your own! by Juno, I cannot comprehend it."

"I can, I can," cried Lucia, raising her voice for the first time, so that it could be heard by any others than her nearest neighbor; "right well can I comprehend it; were I a man myself, I feel that I should pant for the battle. The triumph would be more than rapture; and strife, for its own sake, maddening bliss! Heavens! to see the gladiators wheel and charge; to see their swords flash in the sun; and the red blood gush out unheeded; and the grim faces flushed and furious; and the eyes greedily devouring the wounds of the foeman, but all unconscious of their own; and the play of the muscular strong limbs; and the terrible death grapple! And then the dull hissing sound of the death stroke; and the voiceless parting of the bold spirit! Ye Gods! ye Gods! it is a joy, to live, and almost to die for!"

Paullus Arvina looked at her in speechless wonder. The eyes so wavering and downcast were now fixed, and steady, and burning with a passionate clear light; there was a fiery flush on her cheek, not brief and evanescent; her ripe red mouth was half open, shewing the snow white teeth biting the lower lip in the excitement of her feelings. Her whole form seemed to be dilated and more majestic than its wont.

"Bravo! my girl; well said, my quiet Lucia!" exclaimed Catiline. "I knew not that she had so much of mettle in her."

"You must have thought, then, that I belied my race," replied the girl, unblushingly; "for it is whispered that you are my father, and I think you have looked on blood, and shed it before now!"

"Boar's blood, ha! Lucia; but you are blunt and brave to-night. Is it that Paullus has inspired you?"

"Nay! I know not," she replied, half apathetically; "but I do know, that if I ever love, it shall be a hero; a man that would rather lie in wait until dawn to receive the fierce boar rushing from the brake upon his spear, than until midnight to enfold a silly girl in his embrace."

"Then will you never love me, Lucia," answered Curius.

"Never, indeed!" said she; "it must be a man whom I will love; and there is nothing manly about thee, save thy vices!"

"It is for those that most people love me," replied Curius, nothing disconcerted. "Now Cato has nothing of the man about him but the virtues; and I should like to know who ever thought of loving Cato."

"I never heard of any body loving Cato," said Fulvia, quietly.

"But I have," answered the girl, almost fiercely; "none of you love him; nor do I love him; because he is too high and noble, to be dishonored by the love of such as I am; but all the good, and great, and generous, do love him, and will love his memory for countless ages! I would to God, I could love him!"

"What fury has possessed her?" whispered Catiline to Orestilla; "what ails her to talk thus? first to proclaim herself my daughter, and now to praise Cato?"

"Do not ask me!" replied Aurelia in the same tone; "she was a strange girl ever; and I cannot say, if she likes this task that you have put upon her."

"More wine, ho! bring more wine! Drink we each man to his mistress, each lady to her lover in secrecy and silence!" cried the master of the revel. "Fill up! fill up! let it be pure, and sparkling to the brim."

But Fulvia, irritated a little by what had passed, would not be silent; although she saw that Catiline was annoyed at the character the conversation had assumed, and ere the slave had filled up the beakers she addressed Lucia—

"And wherefore, dearest, would you love Cato? I could as soon love the statue of Accius Naevius, with his long beard, on the steps of the Comitium; he were scarce colder, or less comely than your Cato."

"Because to love virtue is still something, if we be vicious even; and, if I am not virtuous myself, at least I have not lost the sense that it were good to be so!"

"I never knew that you were not virtuous, my Lucia," interposed her mother; "affectionate and pious you have ever been."

"And obedient!" added Catiline, with strong emphasis. "Your mother, my Lucia, and myself, return thanks to the Gods daily for giving us so good a child."

"Do you?" replied the girl, scornfully; "the Gods must have merry times, then, for that must needs make them laugh! But good or bad, I respect the great; and, if I ever love, it will be, as I said, a great and a good man."

"I fear you will never love me, Lucia," whispered Paullus in her ear, unheard amid the clash of knives and flagons, and the pealing of a fresh strain of music, which ushered in the king of fish, the grand conger, garnished with prawns and soused in pungent sauce.

"Wherefore not?" she replied, meeting his eye with a furtive sidelong glance.

"Because I, for one, had rather watch till midnight fifty times, in the hope only of clasping Lucia, once, in my embrace; than once until dawn, to kill fifty boars of Umbria."

She made no answer; but looked up into his face as if to see whether he was in earnest, with an affectionate and pleading glance; and then pressed her unsandalled foot against his. A moment or two afterward, he perceived the embroidered table cover had been drawn up, with the intent of protecting her dress from the sauces of the fish which she was eating, in such a manner as to conceal the greater part of her person.

Observing this, and excited beyond all restraint of ordinary prudence, by the consciousness of her manner, he profited by the chance to steal his arm about her waist; and to his surprise, almost as much as his delight, he felt his hand clasped instantly in hers, and pressed upon her throbbing heart.

The blood gushed like molten fire through his veins. The fascinations of the siren had prevailed. The voice of the charmer had been heard, charming him but too wisely. And for the moment, fool that he was, he fancied he loved Lucia, and his own pure and innocent and lovely Julia was forgotten! Forgotten, and for whom!

Catiline had not lost one word, one movement of the young couple; and he perceived, that, although there was clearly something at work in the girl's bosom which he did not comprehend, she had at least obeyed his commands in captivating Paullus; and he now doubted not but she would persevere, from vanity or passion, and bind him down a fettered captive to her will.

Determined to lose nothing by want of exertion, the traitor circulated now the fiery goblet as fast as possible, till every brain was heated more or less, and every cheek flushed, even of the women, by the inspiring influence of the wine cup.

All dainties that were known in those days ministered to his feast; oysters from Baiae; pheasants—a rarity but lately introduced, since Pompey's conquests in the east—had been brought all the way from Phasis upon the southern shores of the Black Sea; and woodcock from the valleys of Ionia, and the watery plains of Troas, to load the tables of the luxurious masters of the world. Livers of geese, forced to an unnatural size by cramming the unhappy bird with figs; and turbot fricasseed in cream, and peacocks stuffed with truffles, were on the board of Catiline that day, as on the boards of many another noble Roman; and the wines by which these rare dainties were diluted, differed but little, as wisest critics say, from the madeiras and the sherries of the nineteenth century. For so true is it, that under the sun there is nothing new, that in the foix gras of Strasburg, in the turbot a la creme, and in the dindons aux truffes of the French metropolis, the gastronomes of modern days have only reproduced the dishes, whereon Lucullus and Hortensius feasted before the Christian era.

The day passed pleasantly to all, but to Paullus Arvina it flew like a dream, like a delirious trance, from which, could he have consulted his own will, he would never have awakened.

With the dessert, and the wine cup, the myrtle branch and the lute went round, and songs were warbled by sweet voices, full of seductive thoughts and words of passion. At length the lamps were lighted, and the women arose to quit the hall, leaving the ruder sex to prolong the revel; but as Lucia rose, she again pressed the fingers of Arvina, and whispered a request that he would see her once more ere he left the house.

He promised; but as he did so, his heart sank within him; for dearly as he wished it, he believed he had promised that which would prove impossible.

But in a little while, chance, as he thought it, favored him; for seeing that he refused the wine cup, Catiline, after rallying him some time, good humoredly said with a laugh, "Come, my Arvina, we must not be too hard on you. You have but a young head, though a stout one. Curius and I are old veterans of the camp, old revellers, and love the wine cup better than the bright eyes of beauty, or the minstrel's lute. Thou, I will swear it, wouldst rather now be listening to Lucia's lyre, and may be fingering it thyself, than drinking with us roisterers! Come, never blush, boy, we were all young once! Confess, if I am right! The women you will find, if you choose to seek them, in the third chamber on the left, beyond the inner peristyle. We all love freedom here; nor are we rigid censors. Curius and I will drain a flagon or two more, and then join you."

Muttering something not very comprehensible about his exertions in the morning, and his inability to drink any more, Paullus arose, delighted to effect his escape on terms so easy, and left the triclinium immediately in quest of his mistress.

As he went out, Catiline burst into one of his sneering laughs, and exclaimed, "He is in; by Pan, the hunter's God! he is in the death-toil already! May I perish ill, if he escape it."

"Why, in the name of all the Gods, do you take so much pains with him," said Curius; "he is a stout fellow, and I dare say a brave one; and will make a good legionary, or an officer perhaps; but he is raw, and a fool to boot!"

"Raw, but no fool! I can assure you," answered Catiline; "no more a fool than I am. And we must have him, he is necessary!"

"He will be necessary soon to that girl of yours; she has gone mad, I think, for love of him. I never did believe in philtres; but this is well nigh enough to make one do so."

"Pshaw!" answered Catiline; "it is thou that art raw now, and a fool, Curius. She is no more in love with him than thou art; it was all acting—right good acting: for it did once well nigh deceive me who devised it; but still, only acting. I ordered her to win him at all hazards."

"At all hazards?"

"Aye! at all."

"I wish you would give her the like orders touching me, if she obey so readily."

"I would, if it were necessary; which it is not. First, because I have you as firmly mine, as need be; and secondly, because Fulvia would have her heart's blood ere two days had gone, and that would ill suit me; for the sly jade is useful."

"Take care she prove not too sly for you, Sergius. She may obey your orders in this thing; but she does so right willingly. She loves the boy, I tell you, as madly as Venus loved Adonis, or Phaedra Hyppolitus; she would pursue him if he fled from her."

"She loves him no more than she loves the musty statue of my stout grandsire, Sergius Silo."

"You will see one day. Meanwhile, look that she fool you not."

While they were speaking, Paullus had reached the entrance of the chamber indicated; and, opening the door, had entered, expecting to find the three women assembled at some feminine sport or occupation. But fortune again favored him—opportune fortune!

For Lucia was alone, expecting him, prepared for his entrance at any moment; yet, when he came, how unprepared, how shocked, how terrified!

For she had unclasped her stola upon both her shoulders, and suffered it to fall down to her girdle which kept it in its place about her hips. But above those she was dressed only in a tunic of that loose fabric, a sort of silken gauze, which was called woven air, and was beginning to be worn very much by women of licentious character; this dress—if that indeed could be called a dress, which displayed all the outlines of the shape, all the hues of the glowing skin every minute blue vein that meandered over the lovely bosom—was wrought in alternate stripes of white and silver; and nothing can be imagined more beautiful than the effect of its semi-transparent veil concealing just enough to leave some scope for the imagination, displaying more than enough for the most prodigal of beauty.

She was employed in dividing her long jet-black hair with a comb of mother-of-pearl as he entered; but she dropped both the hair and comb, and started to her feet with a simulated scream, covering her beautiful bust with her two hands, as if she had been taken absolutely by surprise.

But Paullus had been drinking freely, and Paullus saw, moreover, that she was not offended; and, if surprised, surprised not unpleasantly by his coming.

He sprang forward, caught her in his arms, and clasping her to his bosom almost smothered her with kisses. But shame on her, fast and furiously as he kissed, she kissed as closely back.

"Lucia, sweet Lucia, do you then love me?"

"More than my life—more than my country—more than the Gods! my brave, my noble Paullus."

"And will you then be mine—all mine, my Lucia?"

"Yours, Paul?" she faltered, panting as if with agitation upon his bosom; "am I not yours already? but no, no, no!" she exclaimed, tearing herself from his embrace. "No no! I had forgotten. My father! no; I cannot, my father!"

"What mean you, Lucia? your father? What of your father?"

"You are his enemy. You have discovered, will betray him."

"No, by the great Gods! you are mad, Lucia. I have discovered nothing; nor if I knew him to be the slayer of my father, would I betray him! never, never!"

"Will you swear that?"

"Swear what?"

"Never, whatever you may learn, to betray him to any living man: never to carry arms, or give evidence against him; but faithfully and stedfastly to follow him through virtue and through vice, in life and unto death; to live for him, and die with him, unless I release you of your oath and restore you to freedom, which I will never do!"

"By all the powers of light and darkness! by Jupiter Omnipotent, and Pluto the Avenger, I swear, Lucia! May I and all my house, and all whom I love or cherish, wretchedly perish if I fail you."

"Then I am yours," she sighed; "all, and for ever!" and sank into his arms, half fainting with the violence of that prolonged excitement.



CHAPTER VII.

THE OATH.

Into what dangers Would you lead me, Cassius? JULIUS CAESAR.

The evening had worn on to a late hour, and darkness had already fallen over the earth, when Paullus issued stealthily, like a guilty thing, from Lucia's chamber. No step or sound had come near the door, no voice had called on either, though they had lingered there for hours in endearments, which, as he judged the spirit of his host, would have cost him his life, if suspected; and though he never dreamed of connivance, he did think it strange that a man so wary and suspicious as Catiline was held to be, should have so fallen from his wonted prudence, as to betray his adopted daughter's honor by granting this most fatal opportunity.

He met no member of the family in the dim-lighted peristyle; the passages were silent and deserted; no gay domestic circle was collected in the tablinum, no slaves were waiting in the atrium; and, as he stole forth cautiously with guarded footsteps, Arvina almost fancied that he had been forgotten; and that the master of the house believed him to have retired when he left the dining hall.

It was not long, however, before he was undeceived; for as he entered the vestibule, and was about to lay his hand on the lock of the outer door, a tall dark figure, which he recognized instantly to be that of his host, stepped forward from a side-passage, and stretched out his arm in silence, forbidding him, by that imperious gesture, to proceed.

"Ha! you have tarried long," he said in a deep guarded whisper, "our Lucia truly is a most soft and fascinating creature; you found her so, is it not true, my Paullus?"

There was something singular in the manner in which these words were uttered, half mocking, and half serious; something between a taunting and triumphant assertion of a fact, and a bitter question; but nothing that betokened anger or hostility, or offended pride in the speaker.

Still Paullus was so much taken by surprise, and so doubtful of his entertainer's meaning, and the extent of his knowledge, that he remained speechless in agitated and embarrassed silence.

"What, have the girl's kisses clogged your lips, so that they can give out no sound? By the gods! they were close enough to do so."

"Catiline!" he exclaimed, starting back in astonishment, and half expecting to feel a dagger in his bosom.

"Tush! tush! young man—think you the walls in the house of Catiline have no ears, nor eyes? Paullus Arvina, I know all!"

"All?" faltered the youth, now utterly aghast.

"Ay, all!" replied the conspirator, with a harsh triumphant laugh. "Lucia has given herself to you; and you have sold yourself to Catiline! By all the fiends of Hades, better it were for you, rash boy, that you had ne'er been born, than now to fail me!"

Arvina, trembling with the deep consciousness of hospitality betrayed, and feeling the first stings of remorse already, stood thunderstricken, and unable to articulate.

"Speak!" thundered Catiline; "speak! art thou not mine—mine soul and body—sworn to be mine forever?"

Alas! the fatal oath, sworn in the heat of passion, flashed on his soul, and he answered humbly, and in a faint low voice, how different from his wonted tones of high and manly confidence—

"I am sworn, Catiline!"

"See then that thou be not forsworn. Little thou dream'st yet, unto what thou art sworn, or unto whom; but know this, that hell itself, with all its furies, would fall short of the tortures that await the traitor!"

"I am, at least, no traitor!"

"No! traitor! Ha!" cried Catiline, "is it an honest deed to creep into the bosom of a daughter of the house which entertained thee as a friend!—No! Traitor—ha! ha! ha! thou shalt ere long learn better—ha! ha! ha!"

And he laughed with the fearful sneering mirth, which was never excited in his breast, but by things perilous and terrible and hateful. In a moment, however, he repressed his merriment, and added—

"Give me that poniard thou didst wear this morning. It is mine."

"Thine!" cried the unhappy youth, starting back, as if he had received a blow; "thine, Catiline!"

"Aye!" he replied, in a hoarse voice, looking into the very eyes of Paul. "I am the slayer of the slave, and regret only that I slew him without torture. Know you whose slave he was, by any chance?"

"He was the Consul's slave," answered Arvina, almost mechanically—for he was utterly bewildered by all that had passed—"Medon, my freedman Thrasea's cousin."

"The Consul's, ha!—which Consul's? speak! fool! speak, ere I tear it from your throat; Cicero's, ha?"

"Cicero's, Catiline!"

"Here is a coil; and knows he of this matter? I mean Cicero."

"He knows it."

"That is to say, you told him. Aye! this morning, after I spoke with you. I comprehend; and you shewed him the poniard. So! so! so! Well, give it to me; I will tell you what to do, hereafter."

"I have it not with me, Sergius," he replied, thoroughly daunted and dismayed.

"See that you meet me then, bringing it with you, at Egeria's cave, as fools call it, in the valley of Muses, at the fourth hour of night to-morrow. In the meantime, beware that you tell no man aught of this, nor that the instrument was bought of Volero. Ha! dost thou hear me?"

"I hear, Catiline."

"And wilt obey?"

"And will obey."

"So shall it go well with thee, and we shall be fast friends forever. Good repose to thee, good my Paullus."

"And Lucia?" he replied, but in a voice of inquiry; for all that he had heard of the tremendous passions and vindictive fury of the conspirator, flashed on his mind, and he fancied that he knew not what of vengeance would fall on the head of the soft beauty.

"Hath played her part rarely!" answered the monster, as he dismissed him from the door, which he opened with his own hand. "Be true, and you shall see her when you will; betray us, and both you and she shall live in agonies, that shall make you call upon death fifty times, ere he relieve you."

And with a menacing gesture, he closed and barred the door behind him.

"Played her part rarely!" The words sank down into his soul with a chilling weight, that seemed to crush every energy and hope. Played her part! Then he was a dupe—the very dupe of the fiend's arch mock, to lip a wanton, and believe her chaste—the dupe of a designing harlot; the sworn tool and slave of a murderer—a monster, who had literally sold his own child's honor. For all the world well knew, that, although Lucia passed for his adopted daughter only, she was his natural offspring by Aurelia Orestilla, before their impious marriage.

Well might he gnash his teeth, and beat his breast, and tear his dark hair by handfulls from his head; well might he groan and curse.

But oh! the inconsistency of man! While he gave vent to all the anguish of his rage in curses against her, the soft partner of his guilt, and at the same time, its avenger; against the murderer and the traitor, now his tyrant; he utterly forgot that his own dereliction, from the paths of rectitude and honor, had led him into the dark toils, in which he now seemed involved beyond any hope of extrication.

He forgot, that to satisfy an insane and unjustifiable love of adventure, and a false curiosity, he had associated himself with a man whom he believed, if he did not actually know, to be infamous and capable of any crime.

He forgot, that, admitted into that man's house in friendship, he had attempted to undermine his daughter's honor; and had felt no remorse, till he learned that his success was owing to connivance—that his own treason had been met and repaid by deeper treason.

He forgot, that for a wanton's love, he had betrayed the brightest, and the purest being that drew the breath of life, from the far Alps, to the blue waters of the far Tarentum—that he had broken his soul's plighted faith—that he was himself, first, a liar, perjurer, and villain.

Alas! it is the inevitable consequence, the first fruit, as it were, of crime, that guilt is still prolific; that the commission of the first ill deed, leads almost surely to the commission of a second, of a third, until the soul is filed and the heart utterly corrupted, and the wretch given wholly up to the dominion of foul sin, and plunged into thorough degradation.

Arvina had thought lightly, if at all, of his first luxurious sin, but now to the depth of his secret soul, he felt that he was emmeshed and entangled in the deepest villainy.

All that he ever had yet heard hinted darkly or surmised of Catiline's gigantic schemes of wickedness, rushed on him, all at once! He doubted nothing any longer; it was clear to him as noonday; distinct and definite as if it had been told to him in so many words; the treason to the state concealed by individual murder; and he, a sworn accomplice—nay, a sworn slave to this murderer and traitor!

Nor was this all; his peril was no less than his guilt; equal on either side—sure ruin if he should be true to his country, and scarce less sure, if he should join its parricides. For, though he had not dared say so much to Catiline, he had already sent the poniard to the house of Cicero, and a brief letter indicating all that he had learned from Volero. This he had done in the interval between the Campus and his unlucky visit to the house of Catiline, whom he then little deemed to be the man of whom he was in quest.

Doubtless, ere this time, the cutler had been summoned to the consul's presence, and the chief magistrate of the Republic had learned that the murderer of his slave was the very person, whom he had bound himself by oaths, so strong that he shuddered at the very thought of them, to support and defend to the utmost.

What was he then to do? how to proceed, since to recede appeared impossible?

How was he to account to the conspirator for his inability to produce the poniard at their appointed meeting? how should he escape the pursuit of his determined vengeance, if he should shun the meeting?

And then, Lucia! The recollection, guilty and degraded as he knew her to be, of her soft blandishments, of her rare beauty, of her wild and inexplicable manner, adding new charms to that forbidden bliss, yet thrilled in every sense. And must he give her up? No! madness was in the very thought! so strangely had she spread her fascinations round him. And yet did he love her? no! perish the thought! Love is a high, a holy, a pure feeling—the purest our poor fallen nature is capable of experiencing; no! this fierce, desperate, guilty passion was no more like true love, than the whirlwind that upheaves the tortured billows, and hurls the fated vessel on the treacherous quicksands, is like to the beneficent and gentle breeze that speeds it to the haven of its hopes, in peace and honor.

After a little while consumed in anxious and uneasy thoughts, he determined—as cowards of the mind determine ever—to temporise, to await events, to depend upon the tide of circumstance. He would, he thought, keep the appointment with his master—for such he felt that Catiline now was indeed—however he might strive to conceal the fact; endeavor to learn what were his real objects; and then determine what should be his own course of action. Doubtful, and weak of principle, and most infirm of purpose, he shrunk alike from breaking the oath he had been entrapped into taking, and from committing any crime against his country.

His country!—To the Roman, patriotism stood for religion!—Pride, habit, education, honor, interest, all were combined in that word, country; and could he be untrue to Rome? His better spirit cried out, no! from every nerve and artery of his body. And then his evil genius whispered Lucia, and he wavered.

Meantime, had no thought crossed him of his own pure and noble Julia, deserted thus and overlooked for a mere wanton? Many times! many times, that day, had his mind reverted to her. When first he went to Cataline's house, he went with the resolution of leaving it at an early hour, so soon as the feast should be over, and seeking her, while there should yet be time to ramble among the flower-beds on the hill of gardens, or perchance, to drive out in his chariot, which he had ordered to be held in readiness, toward the falls of the Anio, or on the proud Emilian way.

Afterward, in the whirl of his mad intoxication for the fascinating Lucia, all memory of his true love was lost, as the chaste moon-light may be dimmed and drowned for a while by the red glare of the torches, brandished in some licentious orgy. Nor did he think of her again, till he found himself saddened, and self-disgusted, plunged into peril—perhaps into ruin, by his own guilty conduct; and then, when he did think, it was with remorse, and self-reproach, and consciousness of disloyalty, so bitterly and keenly painful—yet unaccompanied by that repentance, which steadily envisages past wrong, and determines to amend in future—that he shook off the recollection, whenever it returned, with wilful stubbornness; and resolved on forgetting, for the present, the being whom a few short hours before, he would have deemed it impossible that he should ever think of but with joy and rapturous anticipation.

Occupied in these fast succeeding moods and fancies, Paullus had made his way homeward from the house of Catiline, so far as to the Cerolian place, at the junction of the Sacred Way and the Carinae. He paused here a moment; and grasping his fevered brow with his hand, recalled to mind the strange occurrences, most unexpected and unfortunate, which had befallen him, since he stood there that morning; each singly trivial; each, unconnected as it seemed with the rest, and of little moment; yet all, when united, forming a chain of circumstances by which he was now fettered hand and foot—his casual interview with Catiline on the hill; his subsequent encounter of Victor and Aristius Fuscus; the recognition of his dagger by the stout cutler Volero; the death of Varus in the hippodrome; his own victorious exercises on the plain; the invitation to the feast; the sumptuous banquet; and last, alas! and most fatal, the too voluptuous and seductive Lucia.

Just at this moment, the doors of Cicero's stately mansion were thrown open, and a long train came sweeping out in dark garments, with blazing torches, and music doleful and piercing. And women chanting the shrill funereal strain. And then, upon a bier covered with black, the rude wooden coffin, peculiar to the slave, of the murdered Medon! Behind him followed the whole household of the Consul; and last, to the extreme astonishment of Paullus, preceded by his lictors, and leaning on the arm of his most faithful freedman, came Cicero himself, doing unusual honor, for some cause known to himself alone, to the manes of his slaughtered servant.

As they passed on toward the Capuan gate of the city, the Consul's eyes fell directly on the form of Arvina, where he stood revealed in the full glare of the torch-light; and as he recognised him, he made a sign that he should join him, which, under those peculiar circumstances, he felt that he could not refuse to do.

Sadly and silently they swept through the splendid streets, and under the arched gate, and filed along the celebrated Appian way, passing the tomb of the proud Scipios on the left hand, with its superb sarcophagi—for that great house had never, from time immemorial, been wont to burn their dead—and on the right, a little farther on, the noble temple and the sacred slope of Mars, and the old statue of the god which had once sweated blood, prescient of Thrasymene. On they went, frightening the echoes of the quiet night with their wild lamentations and the clapping of their hands, sending the glare of their funereal torches far and wide through the cultured fields and sacred groves and rich gardens, until they reached at length the pile, hard by the columbarium, or slave-burying-place of Cicero's household.

Then, the rites performed duly, the dust thrice sprinkled on the body, and the farewell pronounced, the corpse was laid upon the pile, and the tall spire of blood-red flame went up, wavering and streaming through the night, rich with perfumes, and gums, and precious ointment, so noble was the liberality of the good Consul, even in the interment of his more faithful slaves.

No words were uttered to disturb the sound of the ceremony, until the flames died out, and, the smouldering embers quenched with wine, Thrasea, as the nearest relative of the deceased, gathered the ashes and inurned them, when they were duly labelled and consigned to their niche in the columbarium; and then, the final Ilicet pronounced, the sad solemnity was ended.

Then, though not until then, did Cicero address the young man; but then, as if to make up for his previous silence, he made him walk by his side all the way back to the city, conversing with him eagerly about all that had passed, thanking him for the note and information he had sent concerning Volero, and anticipating the immediate discovery of the perpetrators of that horrid crime.

"I have not had the leisure to summon Volero before me," he added. "I wished also that you, Arvina, should be present when I examine him. I judge that it will be best, when we shall have dismissed all these, except the lictors, to visit him this very night. He is a thrifty and laborious artisan, and works until late by lamp light; we will go thither, if you have naught to hinder you, at once."

Arvina could do no otherwise than assent; but his heart beat violently, and he could scarcely frame his words, so dreadful was his agitation. Yet, by dint of immense exertion, he contrived to maintain the outward appearance of composure, which he was very far from feeling, and even to keep up a connected conversation as they walked along. Returning home at a much quicker pace than they had gone out, it was comparatively but a short time before they arrived at the house of Cicero, and there dismissed their followers, many of the slaves and freedmen of Arvina having joined the procession in honour of their fellow-servant Thrasea.

Thence, reserving two lictors only of the twelve, the consul with his wonted activity hurried directly forward by the Sacred Way to the arch of Fabius; and then, as the young men had gone in the morning, through the Forum toward the cutler's shop, taking the shortest way, and evidently well acquainted with the spot beforehand.

"I caused the funeral to take place this night," he said to Arvina, "instead of waiting the due term of eight days, on purpose that I might create no suspicion in the minds of the slayers. They never will suspect him, we have buried even now, to be the man they slew last night, and will fancy, it may be, that the body is not discovered even."

"It will be well if it prove so," replied Paullus, feeling that he must say something, and fearful of committing himself by many words.

"It will, and I think probably it may," answered Cicero. "But see, I was right; there shines the light from Volero's shop, though all the other booths have been closed long ago, and the streets are already silent. There are but few men, even in this great city, of whom I know not something, beyond the mere names. Think upon that, young man, and learn to do likewise; cultivate memory, above all things, except virtue."

"I should have thought such things too mean to occupy a place, even, in the mind of Cicero," answered Arvina.

"Nothing, young man, that pertains to our fellow men, is too mean to occupy the mind of the noblest. Why should it, since it doth occupy the mind of the Gods, who are all great and omnipotent?"

"You lean not then to the creed of Epicurus, which teaches——"

"Who, I?" interrupted Cicero, almost indignantly. "No! by the immortal Gods! nor I trust, my young friend, do you. Believe me—but ha!" he added in a quick and altered tone, "what have we here? there is some villainy in the wind—away! away! there! lictors apprehend that fellow."

For as they came within about a bow-shot of the booth of Volero, the sound of a slight scuffle was heard from within, and the light of the lamp became very dim and wavering, as if it had been overset; and in a moment went out altogether. But its last glimmering ray shewed a tall sinewy figure making out of the door and bounding at a great pace up the street toward the Carmental gate.

Arvina caught but a momentary glance of the figure; yet was that glance enough. He recognized the spare but muscular form, all brawn and bone and sinew; he recognized the long and pardlike bounds!—It was his tyrant, and, as he thought, his Fate!

The lictors rushed away upon his track, but there seemed little chance that, encumbered with their heavy fasces, they would overtake so swift a runner, as, by the momentary sight they had of him, the fugitive appeared to be.

Arvina and the Consul speedily reached the booth.

"Volero! Volero!"

But there came forth no answer.

"Volero! what ho! Volero!"

They listened eagerly, painfully, with ears sharpened by excitement. There came a sound—a plash, as of a heavy drop of water falling on the stone floor; another, and another—the trickling of a continuous stream.

All was dark as a moonless midnight. Yet Cicero took one step forward, and laid his hand upon the counter. It splashed into a pool of some warm liquid.

"Now may the Gods avert!" he cried, "It is blood! there has been murder here! Run, my Arvina, run to Furbo's cookshop, across the way there, opposite; they sit up there all night—cry murder, ho! help! murder!"

A minute had scarcely passed before the heavy knocking of the young man had aroused the house—the neighborhood. And at the cry of murder, many men, some who had not retired for the night, and some half dressed as they had sprung up from their couches, came rushing with their weapons, snatched at random, and with torches in their hands.

It was but too true! the laborious artizan was dead; murdered, that instant, at his own counter, at his very work. He had not moved or risen from his seat, but had fallen forward with his head upon the board; and from beneath the head was oozing in a continuous stream the dark red blood, which had overflowed the counter, and trickled down, and made the paved floor one great pool!

"Ye Gods! what blood! what blood!" exclaimed the first who came in.

"Poor Volero! alas!" cried Furbo, "it is not an hour since he supped on a pound of sausages at my table, and now, all is over!"

They raised his head. His eyes were wide open; and the whole face bore an expression neither of agony or terror, so much as of wild surprise.

The throat was cut from ear to ear, dividing the windpipe, the carotid arteries and jugular veins on both sides; and so strong had been the hand of the assassin, and so keen the weapon, that the neck was severed quite to the back bone.

Among the spectators was a gladiator; he whose especial task it was to cut the throats of the conquered victims on the arena; he looked eagerly and curiously at the wound for a moment, and then said—

"A back stroke from behind—a strong hand, and a broadbacked knife—the man has been slain by a gladiator, or one who knows the gladiator's trick!"

"The man," said the Consul calmly, "has been killed by an acquaintance, a friend, or a familiar customer; he had not even risen from his seat to speak with him; and see, the burnisher is yet grasped in his hand, with which he was at work. Ha!" he exclaimed, as his lictors entered, panting and tired by their fruitless chase, "could you not overtake him?"

"We never saw him any more, my consul," replied both men in one breath.

"Let his head down, my friend," said Cicero, turning, much disappointed as it seemed, to Furbo, "let it lie, as it was when we found it; clear the shop, lictors; take the names of the witnesses; one of you keep watch at the door, until you are relieved; lock it and give the key to the praetor, when he shall arrive; the other, go straightway, and summon Cornelius Lentulus; he is the praetor for this ward. Go to your homes, my friends, and make no tumult in the streets, I pray you. This shall be looked to and avenged; your Consul watches over you!"

"Live! live the Consul! the good Consul, the man of the people!" shouted the crowd, as they dispersed quietly to their homes.

"Arvina, come with me. To whom told you, that you had found, and Volero sold, this dagger?" he asked very sternly.

"To no one, Cicero. Marcus Aurelius Victor, and Aristius Fuscus were with me, when he recognized it for his work?"

"No one else?"

"No one, save our slaves, and they," he added in a breath, "could not have heard what passed."

"Hath no one else seen it?"

"As I was stripping for the contests on the Campus, Catiline saw it in my girdle, and admired its fabric."

"Catiline!"

"Ay! Consul?"

"And you told him that Volero had made it?"

"Consul, no!" But, with the word, he turned as white as marble. Had it been daylight, his face had betrayed him; as it was, Cicero observed that his voice trembled.

"Catiline is the man!" he said solemnly, "the man who slew Medon yesternight, who has slain Volero now. Catiline is the man; but this craves wary walking. Young man, young man, beware! methinks you are on the verge of great danger. Get thee home to thy bed; and again I say, Beware!"



CHAPTER VIII.

THE TRUE LOVE.

Dear, my Lord, Make me acquainted with your cause of grief. JULIUS CAESAR.

The sun rose clear and bright on the following morning; the air was fresh and exhilarating, and full of mirthful inspiration. But Paullus Arvina rose unrefreshed and languid, with his mind ill at ease; for the reaction which succeeds ever to the reign of any vehement excitement, had fallen on him with its depressing weight; and not that only, but keen remorse for the past, and, if possible, anxiety yet keener for the future.

Disastrous dreams had beset his sleeping hours; and, at his waking, they and the true occurrences of the past day, seemed all blended and confused into one horrible and hideous vision.

Now he envisaged the whole dark reality of his past conduct, of his present situation. Lucia, the charming siren of the previous evening, appeared in her real colors, as the immodest, passionate wanton; Catiline as the monster that indeed he was!

And yet, alas! alas! as the clear perception of the truth dawned on him, it was but coupled with a despairing sense, that to these he was linked inevitably and forever.

The oath! the awful oath which he had sworn in the fierce whirl of passion, registered by the arch-traitor—the oath involving, not alone, his own temporal and eternal welfare, but that of all whom he loved or cherished; his own pure, beautiful, inimitable Julia, to whom his heart now reverted with a far deeper and more earnest tenderness, after its brief inconstancy; as he compared her strong, yet maidenly and gentle love, with the wild and ungovernable passions of the wanton, for whom he had once sacrificed her.

Paullus Arvina was not naturally, not radically evil. Far from it, his impulses were naturally virtuous and correct, his calm sober thoughts always honorable and upright; but his passions were violent and unregulated; his principles of conduct not definitively formed; and his mind wavering, unsettled, and unsteady.

His passions on the previous day had betrayed him fatally, through the dark machinations of the conspirator, and the strange fascinations of his lovely daughter, into the perpetration of a great crime. He had bound himself, by an oath too dreadful to be thought of without shuddering, to the commission of yet darker crimes in future.

And now the mists of passion had ceased to bedim his mental vision, his eyes were opened, that he saw and repented most sincerely the past guilt. How was he to avoid the future?

To no man in these days, could there be a doubt even for a moment—however great the sin of swearing such an oath! No one in these days, knowing and repenting of the crime, would hesitate a moment, or fancy himself bound, because he had committed one vile sin in pledging himself thus to guilt, to rush on deeper yet into the perpetration of wickedness.

The sin were in the swearing, not in the breaking of an oath so vile and shameful.

But those were days of dark heathenish superstition, and it was far beyond the reach of any intellect perhaps of that day to arrive at a conclusion, simple as that to which any mind would now leap, as it were instinctively.

In those days, an omitted rite, an error in the ceremonial tribute paid to the marble idol, was held a deeper sin than adultery, incest, or blood shedding. And the bare thought of the vengeance due for a broken oath would often times keep sleepless, with mere dread, the eyes of men who could have slumbered calmly on the commission of the deadliest crimes.

Such, then, was the state of Arvina's mind on that morning—grieving with deep remorse for the faults of which he confessed himself guilty; trembling at the idea of rushing into yet more desperate guilt; and at the same time feeling bound to do so, in despite of his better thoughts, by the fatal oath which bound him to the arch traitor.

While he was sitting in his lonely chamber, with his untasted meal of ripe figs, and delicate white bread, and milk and honeycomb before him, devouring his own heart in his fiery anguish, and striving with all his energies of intellect to devise some scheme by which he might escape the perils that seemed to hem him round on every side, his faithful freedman entered, bearing a little billet, on which his eye had scarcely fallen before he recognized the shapely characters of Julia's well-known writing.

He broke the seal which connected the flaxen band, and with a trembling eye, and a soul that feared it knew not what, from the very consciousness of guilt, he read as follows:

"A day has passed, my Paullus, and we have not met! The first day in which we have not met and conversed together, since that whereon you asked me to be yours! I would not willingly, my Paul, be as those miserable and most foolish girls, of whom my mother has informed me, who, given up to jealousy and doubt, torment themselves in vain, and alienate the noble spirits, which are bound to them by claims of affection only, not of compulsion or restraint. Nor am I so unreasonable as to think, that a man has no duties to perform, other than to attend a woman's leisure. The Gods forbid it! for whom I love, I would see great, and famous, and esteemed in the world's eyes as highly as in mine! The house, it is true, is our sphere—the Forum and the Campus, the great world with its toils, its strifes, and its honors, yours! All this I speak to myself often. I repeated it many, many times yesterday—it ought to have satisfied me—it did satisfy my reason, Paul, but it spoke not to my heart! That whispers ever, 'he came not yesterday to see me! he promised, yet he came not!' and it will not be answered. Are you sick, Paullus, that you came not? Surely in that case you had sent for me. Hortensia would have gone with me to visit you. No! you are not sick, else most surely I had known it! Are you then angry with me, or offended? Unconscious am I, dearest, of any fault against you in word, thought, or deed. Yet will I humble myself, if you are indeed wroth with me. Have I appeared indifferent or cold? oh! Paul, believe it not. If I have not expressed the whole of my deep tenderness which is poured out all, all on thee alone—my yearning and continued love, that counts the minutes when thou art not near me; it is not that I cease ever to think of thee, to adore thee, but that it were unmaidenly and overbold to tell thee of it. See, now, if I have not done so here; and my hand trembles, and my cheek burns, and almost I expect to see the pallid paper blush, to find itself the bearer of words so passionate as these. But you will pardon me, and come to me forthwith, and tell me, if anything, in what I have displeased thee.

"It is a lovely morning, and Hortensia has just learned from Caius Bibulus, that at high noon the ambassadors of the wild Allobroges will march in with their escort over the Mulvian Bridge. She wishes much to see the pomp, for we are told that their stature is gigantic and their presence noble, and their garb very wild, yet magnificent withal and martial. Shall we go forth and see them? Hortensia will carry me in her carpentum, and you can either ride with us on horseback, or if you be not over proud take our reins yourself as charioteer, or, what will perhaps be the best of all, come in your own car and escort us. I need not say that I wish to see you now, for that I wish always. Come, then, and quickly, if you would pleasure your own Julia."

"Sweet girl," he exclaimed, as he finished reading it, "pure as the snow upon Soracte, yet warm and tender as the dove. Inimitable Julia! And I—I—Oh, ye gods! ye gods! that beheld it!" and he smote his brow heavily with his hand, and bit his lip, till the blood almost sprang beneath the pressure of his teeth; but recovering himself in a moment, he turned to Thrasea—"Who brought this billet? doth he wait?"

"Phaedon, Hortensia's Greek boy, brought it, noble Paullus. He waits for your answer in the atrium."

"Quick, then, quick, Thrasea, give me a reed and paper."

And snatching the materials he wrote hastily:

"Chance only, evil chance, most lovely Julia, and business of some weight, restrained me from you most unwilling yesterday. More I shall tell you when we meet—indeed all! for what can I wish to conceal from you, the better portion of my soul. Need I say that I come—not, alas, on the wings of my love, or I should be beside you as I write, but as quickly as the speed of horses may whirl me to your presence; until then, fare you well, and confide in the fidelity of Paullus."

"Give it to Phaedon," he said, tossing the note to Thrasea, "and say to him, 'if he make not the better haste, I shall be at Hortensia's house before him.' And then, hark ye, tell some of those knaves in the hall without, to make ready with all speed my light chariot, and yoke the two black horses Aufidus and Acheron. With all speed, mark ye! And then return, good Thrasea, for I have much to say to you, before I go."

When he was left alone, he arose from his seat, walked three or four times to and fro his chamber, in anxious and uneasy thought; and then saying, "Yes! yes! I will not betray him, but I will take no step in the business any farther, and I will tell him so to-night. I will tell him, moreover, that Cicero has the dagger, for now that Volero is slain, I see not well how it can be identified. The Gods defend me from the dark ones whom I have invoked. I will not be untrue to Rome, nor to Julia, any more—perish the whole earth, rather! Ay! and let us, too, perish innocent, better than to live guilty!"

As he made up his mind, by a great effort, to the better course, the freedman returned, and announcing that the car would be ready forthwith, inquired what dress he should bring him.

"Never mind that! What I have on will do well enough, with a petasus;(15) for the sun shines so brightly that it will be scarce possible to drive bare headed. But I have work for you of more importance. You know the cave of Egeria, as men call it, in the valley of the Muses?"

"Surely, my Paullus."

"I know, I know; but have you ever marked the ground especially around the cave—what opportunities there be for concealment, or the like?"

"Not carefully," he answered, "but I have noticed that there is a little gorge just beyond the grotto, broken with crags and blocks of tufo, and overgrown with much brushwood, and many junipers and ivy."

"That will do then, I warrant me," replied Arvina. "Now mark what I tell you, Thrasea; for it may be, that my life shall depend on your acting as I direct. At the fourth hour of the night, I am to meet one in the grotto, on very secret business, whom I mistrust somewhat; who it is, I may not inform you; but, as I think my plans will not well suit his councils, I should not be astonished were he to have slaves, or even gladiators, with him to attack me—but not dreaming that I suspect anything, he will not take many. Now I would have you arm all my freedmen, and some half dozen of the trustiest slaves, so as to have in all a dozen or fifteen, with corslets under their tunics, and boarspears, and swords. You must be careful that you are not seen going thither, and you were best send them out by different roads, so as to meet after nightfall. Hide yourselves closely somewhere, not far from the cavern's mouth, whence you may see, unseen yourselves, whatever passes. I will carry my light hunting horn; and if you hear its blast rush down and surround the cave, but hurt no man, nor strike a blow save in self-defence, until I bid you. Do you comprehend me?"

"I comprehend, and will obey you to the letter, Paullus," answered the grave freedman, "but will not you be armed?"

"I will, my Thrasea. Leave thou a leathern hunting helmet here on the table, and light scaled cuirass, which I will do on under my toga. I shall be there at the fourth hour precisely; but it were well that ye should be on your posts by the second hour or soon after. For it may be, he too will lay an ambuscade, and so all may be discovered."

"It shall be done, most noble master."

"And see that ye take none but trustworthy men, and that ye all are silent—to would be ruin."

"As silent as the grave, my Paullus," answered the freedman.

"The car and horses are prepared, Paullus," exclaimed a slave, entering hastily.

"Who goes with me to hold the reins?" asked his master.

"The boy Myron."

"It is well. Fetch me a petasus, and lay the toga in the chariot. I may want it. Now, Thrasea, I rely on you! Remember—be prudent, sure, and silent."

"Else may I perish ill," replied the faithful servitor, as his master, throwing the broad brimmed hat carelessly on his curly locks, rushed out, as if glad to seek relief from his own gloomy thoughts in the excitement of rapid motion; and, scarcely pausing to observe the condition or appearance of his beautiful black coursers, sprang into the low car of bronze, shaped not much differently from an old fashioned arm chair with its back to the horses; seized the reins, and drove rapidly away, standing erect—for the car contained no seats—with the boy Myron clinging to the rail behind him.

A few minutes brought him through the Cyprian lane and the Suburra to the Virbian slope, by which he gained the Viminal hill, and the Hortensian villa; at the door of which, in a handsome street leading through the Quirinal gate to the Flaminian way, or great northern road of Italy, stood the carpentum, drawn by a pair of noble mules, awaiting its fair freight.

This was a two-wheeled covered vehicle, set apart mostly for the use of ladies; and, though without springs, was as comfortable and luxurious a carriage as the art of that day could produce; nor was there one in Rome, with the exception of those kept for public use in the sacred processions, that could excel that of the rich and elegant Hortensia.

The pannels were beautifully painted, and the arched top or tilt supported by gilded caryatides at the four corners. Its curtains and cushions were of fine purple cloth; and altogether, though far less convenient, it was a much gayer and more sumptuous looking vehicle than the perfection of modern coach building.

The ladies were both waiting in the atrium, when the young man dismounted from his car; and never had his Julia, he thought, looked more lovely than she did this morning, with the redundant masses of her rich hair confined by a net of green and gold, and a rich pallium, or shawl of the same colors, gracefully draped over her snowy stola, and indicating by the soft sweep of its outlines the beauties of a figure, which it might veil but could not conceal.

Joyously, in the frank openness of her pure nature, she sprung forward to meet him, with both her fair hands extended, and the ingenuous blood rising faintly to her pale cheeks.

"Dear, dearest Paul—I am so happy, so rejoiced to see you."

Nothing could be more tender, more affectionate, than all her air, her words, her manner. Love flashed from her bright eyes irrepressible, played in the dimples of her smiling mouth, breathed audible in every tone of her soft silvery voice. Yet was there nothing that the gravest and most rigid censor could have wished otherwise—nothing that he could have pronounced, even for a moment, too warm, or too free for the bearing of the chariest maiden.

The very artlessness of her emotions bore evidence to their purity, their holiness. She was rejoiced to see her permitted lover, she felt no shame in that emotion of chaste joy, and would no more have dreamed of concealing it from him whom she loved so devotedly, than of masking her devotion to the Gods under a veil of indifference or coldness.

Here was the very charm of her demeanor, as here was the difference between her manner, and that of her rival Lucia.

In Julia, every thought that sprang from her heart, was uttered by her lips in frank and fearless innocence; she had no thought she was ashamed of, no wish she feared to utter. Her clear bright eyes dwelt unabashed and fondly on the face of him she loved; and no scrutiny could have detected in their light, one glance of unquiet or immodest passion. Her manner was warm and unreserved toward Paul, because she had a right to love him, and cared not who knew that she did so. Lucia's was as cold as snow, on the contrary; yet it required no second glance to perceive that the coldness was but the cover superinduced to hide passions too warm for revelation. Her eye was downcast; yet did its stolen glances speak things, the secret consciousness of which would have debased the other in her own estimation beyond the hope of pardon. Her tongue was guarded, and her words slow and carefully selected, for her imaginations would have made the brazen face of the world blush for shame could it have heard them spoken.

Hortensia smiled to witness the manifest affection of her sweet child; but the smile was, she knew not why, half mournful, as she said—

"You are unwise, my Julia, to show this truant how much you prize his coming; how painfully his absence depresses you. Sages declare that women should not let their lords guess, even, how much they are loved."

"Why, mother," replied Julia, her bright face gleaming radiantly with the pure lustre of her artless spirit, "I am glad to see him; I do prize his coming; I do love Paullus. Why, then, should I dissemble, when to do so were dishonest, and were folly likewise?"

"You should not tell him so, my child," replied the mother, "I fear you should not tell him so. Men are not like us women, who love but the more devotedly, the more fondly we are cherished. There is, I fear, something of the hunter's, of the conqueror's, ardour, in their passion; the pursuit is the great allurement; the winning the great rapture; and the prize, once securely won, too often cast aside, and disregarded."

"No! no!" returned the girl eagerly, fixing her eyes on her lover's features, as if she would read therein the outward evidences of that nobility of soul, which she believed to exist within. "I will not believe it; it were against all gratitude! all honor! all heart-truth! No, I will not believe it; and if I did, Hortensia, by all the Gods, I had rather live without love, than hold it on so vile a tenure of deceit. What, treasure up the secrets of your soul from your soul's lord? No! no! I would as soon conceal my devotion from the powers of heaven, as my affections from their rightful master. I, for one, never will believe that all men are selfish and unfaithful."

"May the Gods grant, my Julia, that sad experience shall never teach you that they are so. I, at least, will believe, and pray, that, what his sex may be soever, our Paullus will prove worthy ever of that best gift of God, a pure woman's pure and unselfish love."

"Oh! may it be so," answered Paullus, clasping his hands fervently together. "May I die ere I wrong my Julia! and be you sure, sweet girl, that your simple trust is philosophy far truer than the sage's lore. Base must his nature be, and his heart corrupt, who remains unsubdued to artlessness and love, such as yours, my Julia."

"But tell us, now," said the elder lady, "what was it that detained you, and where were you all the day? We expected you till the seventh hour of the night, yet you came not."

"I will tell you, Hortensia," he replied; "as we drive along; for I had rather do so, where there be no ears to overhear us. You must let me be your charioteer to-day, and your venerable grey-headed coachman shall ride with my wild imp Myron, in the car, if you will permit it."

"Willingly," she replied. "Then something strange has happened. Is it not so?"

"I knew it," exclaimed Julia, clasping her snowy hands together, "I knew it; I have read it in his eye this half hour. What can it be? it is something fearful, I am certain."

"Nay! nay! be not alarmed; if there were danger, it is passed already. But come, let me assist you to the carriage; I will tell you all as we go. But if we do not make good speed, the pomp will have passed the bridge before we reach it."

The ladies made no more delay, but took their places in the carriage, Paul occupying the front seat, and guiding the sober mules with far more ease, than Hortensia's aged charioteer experienced in restraining the speed of Arvina's fiery coursers, and keeping them in their place, behind the heavier carpentum.

The narrow streets were now passed, and threading the deep arch of the Quirinal gate, they struck into a lane skirting the base of the hill of gardens, on the right hand, by which they gained the great Flaminian way, just on the farther confines of the Campus; when they drove rapidly toward the Milvian bridge, built a few years before by AEmilius Scaurus, and esteemed for many a year the masterpiece of Roman architecture.

As soon as they had cleared the confines of the busy city, within which the throng of vehicles, and the passengers, as well on foot as on horseback, compelled Arvina to give nearly the whole of his attention to the guidance of the mules—he slackened the reins, and leaving the docile and well-broken animals to choose their own way, giving only an occasional glance to their movements, commenced the detail of his adventures at the point, where he parted from them on the night before the last.

Many were the emotions of fear, and pity, and anxiety which that tale called forth; and more than once the tears of Julia were evoked by sympathy, first, with her lover's daring, then with the grief of Thrasea. But not a shade of distrust came to cloud her pure spirit, for Paullus mentioned nothing of his interview with Catiline on the Caelian, or in the Campus; much less of his dining with him, or detecting in him the murderer of the hapless Volero.

Still he did not attempt to conceal, that both Cicero and himself had suspicions of the identity of the double murderer, or that he was about to go forth that very evening, for the purpose of attempting—as he represented it—to ascertain, beyond doubt, the truth of his suspicions.

And here it was singular, that Julia evinced not so much alarm or perturbation as her mother; whether it was that she underrated the danger he was like to run, or overrated the prowess and valor of her lover. But so it was, for though she listened eagerly while he was speaking, and gazed at him wistfully after he had become silent, she said nothing. Her beautiful eyes, it is true, swam with big tear-drops for a moment, and her nether lip quivered painfully; but she mastered her feelings, and after a short space began to talk joyously about such subjects as were suggested by the pleasant scenery, through which their road lay, or the various groups of people whom they met on the way.

Ere long the shrill blast of a cavalry trumpet was heard from the direction of the bridge, and a cloud of dust surging up in the distance announced the approach of the train.

There was a small green space by the wayside, covered with short mossy turf, and overshadowed by the spreading branches of a single chesnut, beneath which Paullus drew up the mules of Hortensia's carriage, directing the old charioteer, who seemed hard set to manage his high-bred and fiery steeds, to wheel completely off the road, and hold them well in hand on the green behind him.

By this time the procession had drawn nigh, and two mounted troopers, glittering in casques of highly polished bronze, with waving crests of horsehair, corslets of burnished brass, and cassocks of bright scarlet cloth, dashed by as hard as their fiery Gallic steeds could trot, their harness clashing merrily from the rate at which they rode. Before these men were out of sight, a troop of horse rode past in serried order, five abreast, with a square crimson banner, bearing in characters of gold the well-known initials, S. P. Q. R., and surmounted by a gilded eagle.

Nothing could be more beautifully accurate than the ordered march and exact discipline of this little band, their horses stepping proudly out, as if by one common impulse, in perfect time to the occasional notes of the lituus, or cavalry trumpet, by which all their manoeuvres were directed; and the men, hardy and fine-looking figures, in the prime of life, bestriding with an air of perfect mastery their fiery chargers, and bearing the weight of their heavy panoply beneath the burning sunshine of the Italian noon, as though a march of thirty miles were the merest child's play.

About half a mile in the rear of this escort, so as to avoid the dust which hung heavily, and was a long time subsiding in the breathless atmosphere, came the train of the ambassadors from the Gaulish Highlands, and on these men were the eyes of the Roman ladies fixed with undisguised wonder, not unmixed with admiration. For their giant stature, strong limbs, and wild barbaric dresses, were as different from those of the well-ordered legionaries, as were their long light tresses, their blue eyes, keen and flashing as a falcon's, and their fair ruddy skins, from the clear brown complexions, dark locks, and black eyes of the Italian race.

The first of these wild people was a young warrior above six feet in height, mounted on a superb grey charger, which bore his massive bulk as if it were unconscious of his burthen. His large blue eyes wandered around him on all sides with a quick flashing glance that took in everything, yet seemed surprised at nothing; though almost everything which he beheld must have been strange to him. His long red hair flowed down in wavy masses over his neck and shoulders, and his upper lip, though his cheeks and his chin were closely shaven, was clothed with an immense moustache, the ends of which curled upward nearly to his eyes.