Hermione was left alone with her before long, and then Hyacintha spoke.
“Dear one,” she said, “I shall watch no more in the temple at night. I shall feed the fire no more. I am, as Cœlia implies, a Christian. Would you like to know how it has come to pass, my sweet one? I am stronger now, and I will tell you all before I die.”
“Oh! sweet lady, dearest mistress!” Hermione said, “you must not die, you cannot die, to go down to the darksome Hades, to lose the sunlight!”
“Ah, no! ah, no! my child. I go to life; death hath no more power to quench that life which Jesus the Lord has given to me.”
And as if that life of which she spoke had already begun, Hyacintha raised herself on her cushions and said, with all her old fire and earnestness:—
“In that silver coffer, child, are the precious Books—the Word of Life. The holy father Eusebius has from time to time furnished me with those Books. For many years I could not let the whole beautiful fabric of my earthly life slip from me. The struggle between the old faith and the new—rather between the false and the true—has been a fierce one to me. I have travailed in soul in the temple in the lonely watches of the night. I have vowed again and again to the goddess that I would never forsake her. I have gazed up at her image in the dim light, and besought her, if she knew me, if she accepted my service, to give me a sign. But there she has stood, with her veil flowing behind her, in her long robes, motionless and calm. What were my tears to her? What were my agonies of soul? She had never felt them. She had ears, but she heard not; she had eyes, but she saw not. And yet, oh Hermione, I verily believe no torture of martyrdom could be compared to what I have suffered for the last six years.
“While Terentia Rufilla lived, I had not this yearning of soul after better things. I was not the head then, only a member of this community, and if she, noble and gracious as she was, was content, who was I, to doubt?
“Once, on the Cælian Hill, on the very morning of my full consecration, I learned that it was sweet to be loved. My woman’s heart told me that this was the woman’s highest heritage—to be the beloved of a brave, good man. In a vision, as with a lightning flash, I seemed to see a fair landscape stretched out before me, where there was the song of rejoicing and the happiness which comes of a mutual love. Then a cloud swept over it, blotting it from my sight, and I was on a mountain top, so high above others—a Vestal Virgin, devoted to the service of the goddess; high above others—yes, high—but how cold! how lonely! Rumours of the wickedness of the city reached me—foul deeds, which made me blush for the women who took part in them. Emperors and great ones fell; Christians were not exempt from the love of change; there were dissensions amongst them; there were envies, and hatreds, and heartburnings amongst their leaders.
“The Jew hated and cursed the Christian, and yet they both believed in the true God. Was it not better to be safe in these walls, guarded from danger, than to go forth into the city, whose cry, under the name of pleasure, was often a bitter cry, than to confess Christ, and leave the shadow of the cloisters, the safety of the Temple? If I confessed Christ, I reasoned, and came forth, how would the finger of scorn have been pointed at me? how would the unworthiest of motives have been laid at my door? And then, the cruel death had I been recaptured, the death which is the slowest of all deaths to die. I might have escaped, for a word was enough to him of whom I speak, but the motive was mixed, and of the earth: and I trampled down the longing and went on my way. Dost thou remember how, when a little child, they brought thee weeping to Terentia? I held out my arms to thee, and thou didst nestle in them. Ah! dear one, do not weep. Thy love has been my solace many a time.” For Hermione had flung herself on her knees by Hyacintha’s couch, and was weeping wildly and passionately.
She soothed her as a mother soothes a child, and then she said, with a weary sigh:—