Basil muttered with himself. He wished he had been bred a soldier
instead of growing to manhood in an age when the nobles of Rome were
held to inglorious peace, their sole career that of the jurist And
Aurelia, brooding, saw him involved beyond recall in her schemes of
vengeance.

The purple evening fell about them, an afterglow of sunset trembling
upon the violet sea. Above the heights of Capreae a star began to
glimmer; and lo, yonder from behind the mountains rose the great orb
of the moon. They were in the harbour at last, but had to wait on
board until a messenger could go to the village and a conveyance
arrive. The litter came, with a horse for Basil; Felix, together
with Aurelia's grey-headed porter and a female slave--these two
the only servants that had remained in the house at Cumae--
followed on foot, and the baggage was carried up on men's shoulders.

'Decius!' cried Basil, in a passionate undertone, when he
encountered his kinsman in the vestibule. 'Decius! we are here--
and one with us whom you know not. Hush! Stifle your curiosity till
to-morrow. Let them pass.'

So had the day gone by, and not once had he looked upon the face of
Veranilda.

He saw her early on the morrow. Aurelia, though the whole villa was
now at her command, chose still to inhabit the house of Proba; and
thither, when the day was yet young, she summoned Basil. The room in
which she sat was hung with pictured tapestry, representing Christ
and the Apostles; crude work, but such as had pleased Faltonia