The time of her final and long-
expected recovery, was the very day preceding the stormy night we have
already described, and her first employment of her renewed energy was to
send word to the young Goth of her intention of seeking him at his
encampment ere the evening closed.
It was this intimation which caused the inquietude mentioned as
characteristic of the manner of Hermanric at the commencement of the
preceding chapter. The evening there described was the first that saw
him deprived, through the threatened visit of Goisvintha, of the
anticipation of repairing to Antonina, as had been his wont, under cover
of the night; for to slight his kinswoman's ominous message was to risk
the most fatal of discoveries. Trusting to the delusive security of her
sickness, he had hitherto banished the unwelcome remembrance of her
existence from his thoughts. But, now that she was once more capable of
exertion and of crime, he felt that if he would preserve the secret of
Antonina's hiding-place and the security of Antonina's life, he must
remain to oppose force to force and stratagem to stratagem, when
Goisvintha sought him at his post, even at the risk of inflicting, by
his absence from the farm-house, all the pangs of anxiety and
apprehension on the lonely girl.
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