"Where? To the King! To cut down the traitor and his allies! Then assemble the army and--Hail to King Gelimer!"
"Silence, madman!" cried the latter, startled, as if his most secret wish were revealed to him, "you will stay here! Would you add to all the sins which already burden the Vandal race--especially our generation--the crime of dethronement, regicide, the murder of a kinsman? Where is the proof of Hilderic's guilt? Was my long-cherished distrust not merely the fruit, but the pretext,--inspired by my own impatient desire for the throne? Pudentius may lie--exaggerate. Where is the proof that treason is planned?"
"Will you wait till it has succeeded?" cried Zazo, defiantly.
"No! But do not punish till it is proved."
"There speaks the Christian," said the priest, approvingly.--"But the proof must be quickly produced: this very day. Listen, I have reason to believe that Pudentius is in the city now."
"We must have him!" cried Zazo. "Where is he? With the King?"
"They do not work so openly. He steals into the palace only by night. But I know his hiding-place. In the grove of the Holy Virgin--the warm baths."
"Send me, brother! Me! I will fly!"
"Go, then," replied Gelimer, waving his hand.
"But do not kill him," the priest called after the hurrying figure.