"I shall tell her, Paullus. I tell her everything. Since I could babble my first words, I never had a secret from her!"
"Be it so, sweet one. Now I implore you, hear me to the end, before you judge me, and then judge mercifully, as the Gods are merciful, and mortals prone to error."
"And will you tell me the whole truth?"
"The whole."
"Say on, then. I will hear you to the end; and your guilt must be great, Paullus, if you require a more partial arbitress."
It was a trying and painful task, that was forced upon him, yet he went through it nobly. At every word the difficulties grew upon him. At every word the temptation, to swerve from the truth, increased. At every word the dread of losing her, the agony of apprehension, the dull cold sense of despair, waxed heavier, and more stunning. The longer he spoke, the more certain he felt that by his own words he was destroying his own hope; yet he manned his heart stoutly, resisted the foul tempter, and, firm in the integrity of his present purpose, laid bare the secrets of his soul.
Beginning from his discovery of Medon's corpse upon the Esquiline, he now narrated to her fully all that had passed, including much that in his previous tale he had omitted. He told of his first meeting with Cataline upon the Cælian; of his visit to Cicero; of his strange conversation with the cutler Volero; of his second encounter with the traitor in the field of Mars, not omitting the careless accident by which he revealed to him Volero's recognition of the weapon. He told her of the banquet, of the art with which Catiline plied him with wine, of the fascinations of that fair fatal girl. And here, he paused awhile, reluctant to proceed. He would have given worlds, had he possessed them, to catch one glance of her averted eye, to read her features but one moment. But she sat, with her back toward him, her head downcast, tranquil and motionless, save that a tremulous shivering at times ran through her frame perceptible.
He was compelled perforce to continue his narration; and now he was bound to confess that, for the moment, he had been so bewitched by the charms of the siren, that he [pg 230]had bound himself by the fatal oath, scarce knowing what he swore, which linked him to the fortunes of the villain father. Slightly he touched on that atrocity of Catiline, by telling which aloud he dared not sully her pure ears. He then related clearly and succinctly the murder of the cutler Volero, his recognition of the murderer, the forced deception which he had used reluctantly toward Cicero, and the suspicions and distrust of that great man. And here again he paused, hoping that she would speak, and interrupt him, if it were even to condemn, for so at least he should be relieved from the sickening apprehension, which almost choked his voice.
Still, she was silent, and, in so far as he could judge, more tranquil than before. For the quick tremors had now ceased to shake her, and her tears, he believed, had ceased to flow.
But was not this the cold tranquillity of a fixed resolution, the firmness of a desperate, self-controlling effort?