again, her face was wan, tearstained. She summoned her nurse, and
held much talk with her as to the significance of thunder whilst a
corpse lay in the house. The good woman, though she durst not utter
all her thoughts, babbled concern, and used the occasion to beseech
Aurelia--as she had often done since the death of her Gothic lord--to
be reconciled with the true church.

'True church!' exclaimed Aurelia, with sudden passion. 'How do you
know which is the true church? Have not emperors, have not bishops
and numberless holy men lived and died in the faith I confess--?'

She checked herself; grew silent, brooded. Meanwhile, the old nurse
talked on, and presently began to relate how a handmaid of
Petronilla, in going with her this morning, professed to know on the
surest evidence that Aurelia, by her father's deathbed, had
renounced Arianism. The sullen countenance of her mistress flashed
again into wrath.

'Did I not forbid you,' cried Aurelia, 'to converse with those
women? And you dare repeat to me their loose-lipped chatter. I am
too familiar with you; go and talk with your kind; go!'

Mutteringly the woman went apart. The mistress, alone, fell into a
long weeping. When she had sobbed herself into quiet once more, she
sought a volume of the Gospels, inserted her forefinger between the
pages at random, and anxiously regarded the passage thus chosen.

'While ye have the light, believe in the light, that ye may be the
children of light.'