ave 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