“What is your history? Whence do you come?”
“I have no history. My parents were poor, and brought me to Rome when I was four years old, as they came to pray, in discharge of a vow made for my life in early sickness, to the blessed martyrs Chrysanthus and Daria. They left me in charge of a pious lame woman, at the door of the title of Fasciola, while they went to their devotions. It was on that memorable day, when many Christians were buried at their tomb, by earth and stones cast down upon them. My parents had the happiness to be of the number.”
“And how have you lived since?”
“God became my only Father then, and His Catholic Church my mother. The one feeds the birds of the air, the other nurses the weaklings of the flock. I have never wanted for any thing since.”
“But you can walk about the streets freely, and without fear, as well as if you saw.”
“How do you know that?”
“I have seen you. Do you remember very early one morning in the autumn, leading a poor lame man along the Vicus Patricius?”
She blushed and remained silent. Could he have seen her put into the poor old man’s purse her own share of the alms?
“You have owned yourself a Christian?” he asked negligently.
“Oh, yes! how could I deny it?”