"What? Is heroism called a sin?" cried Hilda. "You were fighting only to defend your people."
"Ah, but he found much pleasure in it," replied Gibamund, smiling at his wife. "And he often pursued the Moors farther into the desert, and in following them killed many more with his own hand than the protection of Carthage would have required."
"May Heaven pardon all that I did beyond what was necessary," said Gelimer, in a troubled tone. "The thought, 'It is a sin,' often paralyzed my arm, even in the midst of battle. Often, too, I was overwhelmed by the old melancholy, the torturing fear of sin, the consciousness of guilt, the burden of the curse of the burning woman, the words piercing to the quick: 'All is sin, all is vanity!'
"Then came the day which brought to me the most terrible ordeal,--tortures little less than those suffered by the Catholics, the parents and relatives of Verus, and at the same time the decision, rescue, deliverance, through Verus. Yes, as Jesus Christ is my Redeemer in Heaven, this priest became my savior, my redeemer on earth."
"Do not blaspheme," warned Gibamund. "I, unfortunately, am not so devout a Christian as you; but the Saviour is only like unto, not equal with, God--"
"You have learned your Arian creed by heart, my dear one," cried Hilda, laughing. "But old Hildebrand said he was neither like nor equal to the gods of our ancestors."
"No, for they are demons," said Gelimer, wrathfully, making the sign of the cross.
"Yet I should not like to compare the gloomy Verus with Christ," replied Gibamund.
"I had felt toward him as you, as Zazo, as almost all did; he did not attract, he rather repelled me. That he--he alone of all his kindred, whose death for their faith he had witnessed, should have adopted the religion of their executioners! Was it from fear, or really from conviction? I distrusted him! It displeased me, too, that King Hilderic, the friend of the Byzantines, whose plots against my own succession to the throne I already suspected, so greatly favored him. How greatly I wronged Verus there he has now proved; he--he alone saved me and the Vandal kingdom. Thus he has done visibly what God's sign announced to me in the most terrible moment of my life. Now listen to what only our Zazo yet knows; I told him, as an answer to his warning. Hear, marvel, and recognize the signs and wonders of God."