who were playing on
the shore. Meanwhile she thought over Marcus' startling speech, Damia's
injunctions and Herse's warnings.

At first it seemed to her that Herse might be right, but by degrees she
fell back into her old conviction that the young Christian could mean
no harm by her; and she felt as sure that he would find her out wherever
she might hide herself, as that it was her pretty and much-admired
little person that he sought to win, and not her soul--for what could
such an airy nothing as a soul profit a lover? How rapturously he had
described her charms, how candidly he had owned that her image was
always before him even in his dreams, that he could not and would not
give her up--nay, that he was ready to lay down his life to save her
soul. Only a man in love could speak like this and a man so desperately
in love can achieve whatever he will. On her way from the Xenodochium
to the house of Porphyrius she had passed him in his chariot, and had
admired the splendid horses which he turned and guided with perfect
skill and grace. He was scarcely three years older than herself; he was
eighteen--but in spite of his youth and simplicity he was not unmanly;
and there was something in him--something that compelled her to be
constantly thinking of him and asking herself what that something was.
Old Damia's instructions troubled her; they took much of the charm from
her dream of being loved by Marcus, clasped in his arms, and driven
through the city in his chariot.

It was impossible--yes, quite impossible, she was sure--that they should
have parted forever; as she sat, thinking still of him and glancing from
time to time at the toiling carpenters, a boat pulled up at the landing
close to the barge out of which jumped an officer of the imperial guard.
Such a handsome man! with such a noble, powerful, sunburnt face, a
lightly waving black beard, and hair that fell from under his gold
helmet! The short-sword at his side showed him to be a tribune or
prefect of cavalry, and what gallant deeds must not this brilliant and
glittering young warrior have performed to have risen to such high rank
while still so young! He stood on the shore, looking all round, his
eyes met hers and she felt herself color; he seemed surprised to see her
there and greeted her respectfully with a military salute; then he went
on towards the unfinished hulk of a large ship whose bare curved ribs
one or two foremen were busily measuring with tape and