She explained at length why she had been
called imperatively to Aquileia, why he felt bound to remain there and how
it was that she had agreed to travel to Aquileia to be married there,
instead of his returning to Rome, which would have been the most
conventional arrangement.
While she was telling me this we heard not only the noise of the feeding
of the two lions which were eating the dead horses, but heard also a third
animal as noisily tearing at one of the dead mules behind the coach.
"I cannot believe," she said, "that I ever consented to marry anybody
else, even when I was certain you were dead. But you know, Caius, it is
natural to be married; and to live alone, as maid or widow, is not only
lonesome and unnatural, but unfashionable and absurd.
"But, now that I know you are alive, I shall not care who thinks me
ridiculous or who calls me silly; I shall feel lonely, but lonely merely
because I cannot live with you. I shall jilt poor dear Pacullus, who is as
good a man and as good a fellow as ever lived, and I shall stick to my
widowhood until I die or Commodus joins the company of the gods and we can
arrange for your full rehabilitation and the restoration of your estates
and rank."
Just as she said this we distinctly heard clawing and snuffing against the
panels behind our heads, opposite where the lions were feasting.
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