She looked off over the river.
“Why did you ask?” he said.
“Good my master—”
“No, no, Esther—not that. Call me friend—brother, if you will; I am not your master, and will not be. Call me brother.”
He could not see the flush of pleasure which reddened her face, and the glow of the eyes that went out lost in the void above the river.
“I cannot understand,” she said, “the nature which prefers the life you are going to—a life of—”
“Of violence, and it may be of blood,” he said, completing the sentence.
“Yes,” she added, “the nature which could prefer that life to such as might be in the beautiful villa.”
“Esther, you mistake. There is no preference. Alas! the Roman is not so kind. I am going of necessity. To stay here is to die; and if I go there, the end will be the same—a poisoned cup, a bravo’s blow, or a judge’s sentence obtained by perjury. Messala and the procurator Gratus are rich with plunder of my father’s estate, and it is more important to them to keep their gains now than was their getting in the first instance. A peaceable settlement is out of reach, because of the confession it would imply. And then—then— Ah, Esther, if I could buy them, I do not know that I would. I do not believe peace possible to me; no, not even in the sleepy shade and sweet air of the marble porches of the old villa—no matter who might be there to help me bear the burden of the days, nor by what patience of love she made the effort. Peace is not possible to me while my people are lost, for I must be watchful to find them. If I find them, and they have suffered wrong, shall not the guilty suffer for it? If they are dead by violence, shall the murderers escape? Oh, I could not sleep for dreams! Nor could the holiest love, by any stratagem, lull me to a rest which conscience would not strangle.”
“Is it so bad then?” she asked, her voice tremulous with feeling. “Can nothing, nothing, be done?”