The waves of the silvery sea lapped soft and lazy against the marble steps on the beach, all else around was still, and Dorothea's little devices were at an end.
Weeping, she slipped away with the collected fragments of the vase to hide them in her room.
They did not see each other again for many months. Theophilus returned at once to the capital, and when Dorothea went back there in the autumn, he sedulously avoided encountering her; for the mere possibility of meeting her alarmed and excited him. So all their happiness was gone for the nonce.
The natural result was that she sought consolation in the new faith of her parents, and as soon as they observed this, they lost no time in deciding their child in her resolution, and initiating her fully into their faith and practice.
Meanwhile, Dorothea's assumed friendliness for the governor had also its unfortunate effect, in that Fabricius considered himself justified in renewing his courtship with redoubled energy. He was all the more surprised, therefore, when Dorothea could scarcely endure the sight of him, and he seemed to have become more repugnant to her than Misfortune herself. But he did not draw back on that account; rather, he increased his importunity and began to quarrel with her because of her new faith, and to assail her conscience as he mingled flatteries with thinly-veiled threats.
Dorothea, however, acknowledged her faith openly and fearlessly, and turned away from him as from an unsubstantial shadow which cannot be seen.
Theophilus heard of all this, and how the good maiden was not having the happiest life of it. What surprised him most was the news that she would have nothing whatever to do with the proconsul. Although he was old-world or indifferent in the matter of religion, he was not offended at the maiden's new faith, and with his partiality for her he began to be more in her company again, the better to see and hear how she was faring. But in her present mood, she could speak of nothing except in the tenderest and most languishing accents of a Heavenly Bridegroom whom she had found, who was awaiting her in immortal beauty, to take her to His radiant breast, and give her the rose of eternal life, and so forth.
He could make neither head nor tail of this language. It offended and annoyed him, and filled his heart with a strange, painful jealousy of the unknown God who perverted a weak woman's mind; for he could not understand and interpret the excited and enthusiastic Dorothea's expressions otherwise than in the old mythological fashion. Jealousy of a superhuman being did not hurt his pride, but it blunted his sympathy with the woman who boasted of being united to deities. Yet it was nothing else than her unrequited love for himself that put such language into her mouth, just as he himself had the thorn of passion always fixed in his heart.
Matters had dragged on thus for some little time, when Fabricius suddenly pounced down. Taking advantage of renewed Imperial orders for a persecution of Christians, he had Dorothea and her parents imprisoned. The daughter, however, was placed in a separate gaol, and put to the question about her faith. Full of curiosity, he went in person and heard her loudly repudiating the ancient gods, and confessing as the only Lord of the world Christ, whose betrothed bride she was. At that, a savage jealousy took possession of the governor also. He resolved on her destruction, and ordered her to be tortured and, if she still persisted, to be put to death. Then he departed. She was laid on a gridiron, under which coals were fanned to a glow in such a fashion that the heat only increased slowly. Still, it hurt her tender frame. She uttered stifled screams for a time, while her limbs, which were chained down to the gridiron, quivered, and tears flowed from her eyes. Theophilus, who usually refrained from taking any part in such persecutions, had heard of the business, and hastened to her full of horror and disquiet. Forgetful of his own safety, he thrust his way through the gaping populace, and, when with his own ears he heard Dorothea's low moans, he snatched a sword from a soldier's hand, and stood at one bound before her bed of torture.
"Does it hurt, Dorothea?" he enquired with a bitter smile, intending to cut her fastenings. But she answered, feeling suddenly as if all pain had left her and she were filled with the most perfect bliss, "How could it hurt me, Theophilus? It is the roses of my well-beloved Bridegroom that I am lying upon. See! To-day is my wedding-day!"