"Happy superstition!" cried Flavia, embracing him: "and so I trust our long sorrows are over, my dear son. We have needed thee much; but now that thou wilt not leave us more, my cares are at an end: and when I have seen thee and my Ildica united for ever, I willingly quit a world of which I have long been weary."
"Quit us not, my mother!" replied Theodore, "quit us not! but remain with us, to behold our happiness and to share it! But oh, let that happiness be made complete as soon as may be. Let no time elapse ere Ildica becomes my own. Till I hold her to my heart, my own dear wife, I shall fear lest every hour that flies may bring some new misfortune to separate us again. Say, Ildica, say, when will you be mine?"
The blood rose in the beautiful girl's cheek, and neck, and brow, spreading through that pure and ivory skin like the blush of dawn upon the snowy heads of the mountains; and feeling how the crimson was mounting in her face, she hid it upon her lover's breast, replying, "When my mother thinks fit."
"To-morrow! oh, to-morrow, dear mother!" cried Theodore.
"Nay, nay," said Flavia, with a smile, "not quite so soon as that! Let it be the following day. What say you, Ildica? Is that too soon?"
"Speak, beloved! speak!" cried Theodore; but she still hid her eyes upon his breast, and yet the soft clasping of her hand upon his told him that she gave no unwilling consent. Feeling that she was much agitated, he sought some other theme to release her mind from its happy burden, till custom should render it lighter to bear.
"She consents, my mother!" he said, "she consents! but where is Eudochia? She must come and share our joy. I wonder she has not yet heard of her brother's return."
"She has gone to the capitol," replied Ildica, raising her head: "there is a splendid sight there to-day; and Ammian sent a messenger to say he had found a place for her where she could see it all."
"Ammian!" exclaimed Theodore: "I heard, as I came along, that he had gone out of the city towards Pincianus."
"Oh no," replied Flavia: "he went to the capitol, and sent both a messenger and a litter for Eudochia, saying that he had found a place for her at the house of Julius Sabinus, otherwise she should not have gone."