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Constans would occasionally note a few fresh tracks along the Palace Road, and the smoke that curled steadily from scattered chimney-pots and the bivouac fires on the Citadel Square might be taken as evidence that the suspension of social activities was only temporary.
Constantius was busy with the Persian war, and could not refuse; so it was summoned to meet in the summer of 343. To the dismay of the Eusebians, the place chosen was Sardica in Dacia, just inside the dominions of Constans. After their failure with the Eastern bishops at Antioch, they could not hope to control the Westerns in a free council. To Sardica the bishops came.
A great roar of laughter went up, and under cover of it Constans managed to push his way on through the crowd and so reach the open square. Stepping into one of the empty guard-huts he quickly divested himself of cowl and cassock, and rolling them up into a bundle he tossed them into a dark corner.
The little company moved slowly down the avenue; then, turning into a side thoroughfare, proceeded directly eastward. For the first few days following upon his arrival in the city, Constans kept under rover, venturing forth only after nightfall.
"Stop! I have zink of something. Zere is one old vehicle in ze shed, laid by for repairs. By careful handling it would do." "Good! Get horses hitched to it; we must lose no time. To the rescue, Monsieur Constans. Ladies have been hurt; they must be taken to the city as speedily as possible."
The glimpses that he got through the windows of the deserted shops amazed him; a hundred times he would fain have halted to investigate some fresh marvel. But he withstood the temptation, telling himself that these things were but trifles, and that the real objects of his quest lay farther on. An hour's walk brought Constans to within three blocks of the building with the tower.
The horseman had retained the feathered end of the arrow-shaft, and he proceeded to examine it with an appearance of polite interest. "Your private token, young sir?" he inquired, indicating the single feather of scarlet. His voice was pitched in an affectedly high key, his manner languidly ceremonious. Constans could only bow stiffly in the affirmative.
It is not surprising, then, that Constans was momentarily puzzled by the narrow, delicately lined marks that betokened the passage of a real carriage. For while Doom contained many examples of the ancient coach-builder's skill, they were not in general use. The old Dom Gillian occasionally employed a carriage in taking the air at least, so Ulick had told him, but Constans had never seen it.
But he took no account of these smaller things, his eyes being full of Esmay only, and surely that was she who stood there in the shelter of Quinton Edge's arms; now she half turned her head, the better to look into her lord's face, and Constans could trace the outline of her profile the upper lip, so deliciously short, and the exquisite curve of her throat.
The priest went to the switch-board, and, after a series of genuflections and the mumbling of what might have been an invocation, he turned a lever. Constans stepped back hastily. "Now is the Shining One come upon his throne. Take your seat at his side if you would put his divinity to the proof. Or else be content to serve him in silence and singleness of heart, even as I."
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