She lifted to him eyes filled with a strange light. The gray mantle
she wore fell away from her skinny arm as she raised it high.

"Woe! woe to the house of Lucanus!" she cried shrilly. "Your feasting
shall be turned into sorrow, your rejoicing shall be changed into
mourning and the voice of weeping shall be heard, a mother weeping for
her daughter, a father bemoaning the loss of his children, a
bridegroom grieving over a lost bride. Woe! Woe!"

Virgilia and her mother were clinging to each other. The Senator was
pallid and shaking with fear.

"Woe! woe to the house of Lucanus!" wailed the aged woman, and would
have fallen if Martius had not caught her in his strong arms.

The slaves, frightened, had gathered in the doorway. At a sign from
Aurelius, they carried her away, while Sahira tried to assist Virgilia
to calm her mother.

"She is very aged," explained the lawyer.

"She must be crazy," energetically remarked the Senator, demanding his
chair.

When he had gone away, and Claudia was in bed, with Virgilia, by her
side, the lawyer sat a long time in his little room and thought.

What was this woe that the Old One had prophesied for him and his
household?