"Bravo! my girl; well said, my quiet Lucia!" exclaimed Catiline. "I knew not that she had so much of mettle in her."
"You must have thought, then, that I belied my race," replied the girl, unblushingly; "for it is whispered that you are my father, and I think you have looked on blood, and shed it before now!"
"Boar's blood, ha! Lucia; but you are blunt and brave to-night. Is it that Paullus has inspired you?"
"Nay! I know not," she replied, half apathetically; "but I do know, that if I ever love, it shall be a hero; a man that would rather lie in wait until dawn to receive the fierce boar rushing from the brake upon his spear, than until midnight to enfold a silly girl in his embrace."
"Then will you never love me, Lucia," answered Curius.
"Never, indeed!" said she; "it must be a man whom I will love; and there is nothing manly about thee, save thy vices!"
"It is for those that most people love me," replied Curius, nothing disconcerted. "Now Cato has nothing of the man about him but the virtues; and I should like to know who ever thought of loving Cato."
"I never heard of any body loving Cato," said Fulvia, quietly.
"But I have," answered the girl, almost fiercely; "none of you love him; nor do I love him; because he is too high and noble, to be dishonored by the love of such as I am; but all the good, and great, and generous, do love him, and will love his memory for countless ages! I would to God, I could love him!"
"What fury has possessed her?" whispered Catiline [pg 102]to Orestilla; "what ails her to talk thus? first to proclaim herself my daughter, and now to praise Cato?"