love; we have
talked from heart to heart.'

'Yet it was at his intercession that the Hun allowed us to go; why, you
cannot guess. What if he have power and motives which threaten
Veranilda's peace?'

Basil exclaimed against this as the baseless fear of a woman. Had there
been a previous command from some high source touching the Gothic
maiden, Chorsoman would never have dared to sell her freedom. As to
Marcian's power, that was derived from the authorities at Rome, and
granted him for other ends; if he used it to release Veranilda, he
acted merely out of love to his friend, as would soon be seen.

'I will hope so,' murmured Aurelia. 'Now you have heard what she
herself desired that I should tell you, for she could not meet your
look until you knew it. Her father's treachery is Veranilda's shame;
she saw her noble mother die for it, and it has made her mourning
keener than a common sorrow. I think she would never have dared to wed
a Goth; all true Goths, she believes in her heart, must despise her. It
is her dread lest you, learning who she is, should find your love
chilled.'

'Call her,' cried Basil, starting to his feet. 'Or let me go to her.
She shall not suffer that fear for another moment. Veranilda!
Veranilda!'

His companion retained and quieted him. He should see Veranilda ere
long. But there was yet something to be spoken of.

'Have you forgotten that she is not of your faith?'

'Do I love her, adore her, the less?' exclaimed Basil. 'Does she shrink
from me on that account?'

'I know,' pursued his cousin, 'what the Apostle of the Gentiles has
said: "For the husband who believes not is sanctified by the wife, and
the wife who believes not is sanctified by the husband." None the less,
Veranilda is under the menace of the Roman law; and you, if it be known
that you have wedded her, will be in peril from all who serve the
Emperor--at least in dark suspicion; and will be slightly esteemed by
all of our house.'

The lover paced about, and all at once, with a wild gesture, uttered
his inmost thought.

'What if I care naught for those of our house? And what if the Emperor
of the East is of as little account to me? My country is not Byzantium,
but Rome.'

Aurelia hushed his voice, but her eyes shone with stern gladness as she
stood before him, and took him by the hand, and spoke what he alone
could hear.

'Then unite yourself in faith with those who would make Rome free. Be
one in religion with the bra