“You have a home, father and mother?” Damaris asked.
“We had,” sobbed Ethne; “and oh! I trust we have still! If only we could know! Patrick said in his letter, that the pirates killed many when they took us captive; and Dewi, the British sailor, who was one of them, promised to go home and tell our people of us, and then to come back and find us out, and tell us of them. And if God helps him he will.”
Damaris laid the fair head on her shoulder, and gradually the whole story came out. They were interrupted by a bell sounding from the oratory which had belonged to Marcella and the Ecclesia Domestica of the Aventine; and they all went thither, and knelt together for the morning prayer.
Afterwards, while the brother and sister had their morning meal together, Damaris and Fabricius consulted what should be done with them. It was clear from what Miriam had said, and Baithene confirmed, that the eyes of one of the officers of the Emperor’s household had rested covetously on the three, that is, the youth, the maiden, and the dog, and that they must as little as possible for the present be seen in public together.
It was decided, therefore, that Fabricius should take Baithene and the dog to a country house belonging to the family among the Sabine hills, near Nero’s villa of Sublacum (Subiaco), whilst Ethne should remain with Damaris and Lucia on the Aventine. To restore them to their home in the far-off Western isle, while so much of the intervening continent was ravaged by barbarian tribes, or infested by Imperial armies and officials, often worse than the barbarians, was at present out of the question. The safest course for the captives, it was concluded, was to treat them as part of the property and household of Fabricius, under such protection as his patrician and senatorial rank could give. This decision was communicated to the brother and sister as the only possible course to be taken at the moment.
“But peril is nothing to us,” Baithene said appealingly, “if only we could reach our own land again.”
“It is for your sister that the peril involved in such a journey cannot be encountered!” Fabricius replied.
“But surely,” Ethne ventured to plead, “if it is His way, God will guard us in it.”
“It is not the Divine way,” rejoined Fabricius, with Roman imperiousness. “For it is not ours for you. God has committed you to us, and we have to guard you as our own.”
And Damaris added—