‘You know that the deacon is yonder,’ she said in a low voice to Basil, this the first mention of Leander that had fallen from her lips in speaking with him.

‘Is he?’ returned the other carelessly.  ‘Yes, I remember.’

But Basil’s eyes were turned to the long promontory of Misenum.  He was wondering anxiously how his letter had affected Veranilda, and whether, when she heard of it, Aurelia would be angered.

‘Where is your friend Marcian?’ were her next words.

Basil replied that he, too, was sojourning at Neapolis; and, when Aurelia inquired what business held him there, her cousin answered truly that he did not know.

‘Do you trust him?’ asked the lady, after a thoughtful pause.

‘Marcian?  As I trust myself!’

One of the boatmen coming within earshot, their conversation ceased.

The hour before noon saw them drawing near to land.  They left on the right the little island of Nesis, and drew towards Puteoli.  On the left lay Baiae, all but forsaken, its ancient temples and villas stretching along the shore from the Lucrine lake to the harbour shadowed by Cape Misenum; desolate magnificence, marble overgrown with ivy, gardens where the rose grew wild, and terraces crumbling into the sea.  Basil and Aurelia looked upon these things with an eye made careless by familiarity; all their lives ruin had lain about them, deserted sanctuaries of a bygone creed, unpeopled homes of a vanished greatness.

As the boat advanced into the bay, it lost the wind, and rowing again became needful.  Thus they entered the harbour of Puteoli, where the travellers disembarked.

Hard by the port was a tavern, which, owing to its position midway between Neapolis and Cumae, still retained something of its character as a mansio of the posting service; but the vehicles and quadrupeds of which it boasted were no longer held in strict reserve for state officials and persons privileged.  Gladly the innkeeper put at Basil’s disposal his one covered carriage, a trifle cleaner inside than it was without, and a couple of saddle horses, declared to be Sicilian, but advanced in age.  Thus, with slight delay, the party pursued their journey, Basil and his man riding before the carriage.  The road ran coastwise as far as the Julian haven, once thronged with the shipping of the Roman world, now all but abandoned to a few fishermen; there it turned inland, skirted the Lucrine water, and presently reached the shore of Lake Avernus, where was the entrance to the long tunnel piercing the hill between the lake and Cumae.  On an ill-kept way, under a low vault of rock dripping moisture, the carriage with difficulty tossed and rumbled through the gloom.  Basil impatiently trotted on, and, as he issued into sunlight, there before him stood the walls of the ancient city, round about that little hill by the sea which, in an age remote, had been chosen for their abode by the first Hellenes tempted to the land of Italy.  High above rose the acropolis, a frowning stronghold.  Through Basil’s mind passed the thought that ere long Cumae might again belong to the Goths, and this caused him no uneasiness; half, perchance, he hoped it.