word.

At a distance of some twenty yards from the end of the tunnel,
Felix, riding in advance, checked his horse and shouted. There on
the ground lay a dead man, a countryman, who it was easy to see had
been stabbed to death, and perhaps not more than an hour ago.
Quarrel or robbery, who could say? An incident not so uncommon as
greatly to perturb the travellers; they passed on and came to
Puteoli. Here the waiting boatmen were soon found; the party
embarked; the vessel oared away in a dead calm.

The long voyage was tedious to Basil only because Veranilda remained
unseen in the cabin; the thought of bearing her off; as though she
were already his own, was an exultation, a rapture. When he
reflected on the indignities he had suffered in the citadel rage
burned his throat, and Aurelia, all bitterness at the loss of her
treasure, found words to increase this wrath. A Hun! A Scythian
savage! A descendant perchance of the fearful Attila! He to
represent the Roman Empire! Fit instrument, forsooth, of such an
Emperor as Justinian, whose boundless avarice, whose shameful
subjection to the base-born Theodora, were known to every one. To
this had Rome fallen; and not one of her sons who dared to rise
against so foul a servitude!

'Have patience, cousin,' Basil whispered, bidding her with a glance
beware of the nearest boatman. 'There are some who will not grieve
if Totila--'

'No more than that? To stand, and look on, and play the courtier to
whichever may triumph!'