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Updated: June 6, 2025
'Good; he will recover from his fatigue. But pray inquire whether he is now awake, for I would speak with him as soon as may be. The lady was absent for a minute or two, then brought word that the traveller had just awoke. 'I will go to his bedside, said Venantius.
'Will it please your Illustrious Magnanimity to eat with us? 'I will eat when I choose. Fetch here Venantius. Marcian despatched the porter, and in a few moments Venantius appeared, behind him his armed men. A hand lightly on his sword, as though he played with the hilt, his head proudly erect, the Roman noble paused at a few paces from the Hun, and regarded him with bold steadfastness.
Once more she looked at Basil, for an instant, with wide eyes of fear; then hid herself beneath the veil, and was gone. Basil rode with his own man apart from Venantius and the soldiers who guarded the conveyance in which sat Veranilda. Venantius, for his part, would fain have lightened the way with friendly talk, but finding Basil irresponsive, he left him to his gloomy meditations.
Meanwhile Basil and Marcian have spent an hour in talk, the result of which was a decision that Marcian should again repair to the stronghold of Venantius, and persuade him to come over to Surrentum.
And if, when you have turned tail, any cur among you dares to bark back that I, Venantius of Nuceria, am no true Catholic, he shall pay for the lie with an arrow through chine and gizzard! This threat he confirmed with a terrific oath of indisputable orthodoxy. The effect was immediate.
Marcian, on his double mission of spy in the Greek service and friend of the Goths, had naturally sought out Venantius; and the description he gave to Basil of the fortress above Nuceria filled the listener with enthusiasm. 'I would I could live in the same way, Basil exclaimed. 'And why not? My own villa in Picenum might be strengthened with walls and towers.
On her right hand stands St. Paul, on her left St. Peter; beyond St. Peter and St. Paul, St. John the Baptist holding a cross, and St. John the Evangelist holding a book; and beyond these again, St. Domino and St. Venantius, two martyred saints, who perished in Dalmatia, and whose relics were brought out of that country by the founder of the chapel, John IV., himself a Dalmatian by birth.
'That is Chorsoman, said Marcian, as soon as he could distinguish the captain's feature, 'the commander at Cumae. 'Then it is not to Cumae that they have carried her! exclaimed Basil, surmising at once that the Hun was come in pursuit of Veranilda. 'Time enough to think of that, growled Venantius, as he glared from under black brows at the advancing horsemen. 'What are we to do?
It will not be long before you have the occasion you desire of proving your loyalty to the Emperor. Brave men both, we may presently fight side by side. Let us sit at table together, and then good-speed! With a haughty glare Venantius heard this dismissal. A reply surged into his throat, but he swallowed it again, remembering that more than his personal safety was at stake.
As he spoke, Basil himself appeared; and with brief preface, the matter under debate was reported to him. He glanced at Venantius but could find no counsel in the dark, stern face. Foreseeing the result of the Hun's visit, Basil had hastened to conceal on his own person a considerable weight of coin, and had intrusted something like the same amount to Felix.
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