After
looking steadfastly on her for a moment, Ulpius approached and raised
her from the earth.
'Come!' he cried angrily, 'the night grows on--your father waits!'
'The walls of Rome shut me from my father! I shall never see my father
nor Hermanric again!' she cried, in tones of bitter anguish, remembering
more perfectly all the miseries of her position, and struggling to
release herself from the Pagan's grasp.
The walls of Rome! At those words the mind of Ulpius opened to a flow
of dark remembrances, and lost the visions that had occupied it until
that moment. He laughed triumphantly.
'The walls of Rome bow to my arm!' he cried, in exulting tones; 'I
pierced them with my good bar of iron! I wound through them with my
bright lantern! Spirits roared on me, and struck me down, and grinned
upon me in the thick darkness, but I passed the wall! The thunder
pealed around me as I crawled along the winding rifts; but I won my way
through them! I came out conquering on the other side! Come, come,
come, come! We will return! I know the track, even in the darkness! I
can outwatch the sentinels! You shall walk in the pathway that I have
broken through the bricks!
The girl's features lost for a moment their expression of grief, and
grew rigid with horror, as she glanced at his fiery eyes, and felt the
fearful suspicion of his insanity darkening over her mind.
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