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slight scratch, the Goth fell slain before the hovel. His comrades were unarmed and intimidated. They rushed back to fetch weapons from the house of Deodatus, and there had been full time to take Columba safely home, Verronax and his dog stalking statelily in the rear as her guardians.
"Thou shouldst have sought thine impregnable crag, my son," said the Senator sadly.
"To bring the barbarian vengeance upon this house?" responded Verronax.
"Alas, my son, thou know'st mine oath."
"I know it, my father."
"It forbids not thy ransoming thyself."
Verronax smiled slightly, and touched the collar at his throat.
"This is all the gold that I possess."
The Senator rapidly appraised it with his eye. There was a regular tariff on the lives of free Romans, free Goths, guests, and trusted men of the King; and if the deceased were merely a LITE, or freeman of the lowest rank, it was just possible that the gold collar might purchase its master's life, provided he were not too proud to part with the ancestral badge.
By this time the tribunal had been reached--a special portion of the peristyle, with a curule chair, inlaid with ivory, placed on a tesselated pavement, as in the old days of the Republic, and a servant on each side held the lictor's axe and bundle of rods, which betokened stern Roman justice, wellnigh a mockery now. The forum of the city would have been the regular place, but since an earthquake had done much damage there, and some tumults had taken place among the citizens, the seat of judgment had by general consent been placed in the AEmilian household as the place of chief security, and as he was the accredited magistrate with their Gothic masters, as Sidonius had been before his banishment.
As Sidonius looked at the grave face of the Senator, set like a rock, but deadly pale, he thought it was no unworthy representative of Brutus or Manlius of old who sat on that seat.
Alas! would he not be bound by his fatal oath to be only too true a representative of their relentless justice?
On one side of the judgment-seat stood Verronax, towering above all around; behind him Marina and Columba, clinging together, trembling and tearful, but their weeping restrained by the looks of the Senator, and by a certain remnant of hope.
To the other side advanced the Goths, all much larger and taller men than any one except the young Gaulish chieftain. The foremost was a rugged-looking veteran, with grizzled locks and beard, and a sunburnt face. This was Meinhard, the head of the garrison on Deodatus's farm, a man well known to AEmilius, and able to speak Latin enough to hold communication with the Romans. Several younger men pressed rudely behind him, but they were evidently impressed by the dignity of the tribunal, though it was with a loud and fierce shout that they recognised Verronax standing so still and unmoved.
"Silence!" exclaimed the Senator, lifting his ivory staff.
Meinhard likewise made gestures to hush them, and they ceased, while the Senator, greeting Meinhard and inviting him to share his seat of authority, demanded what they asked.
"Right!" was their cry. "Right on the slayer of Odorik, the son of Odo, of the lineage of Odin, our guest, and of the King's trust."
"Right shall ye have, O Goths," returned AEmilius. "A Roman never flinches from justice. Who are witnesses to the deed? Didst thou behold it, O Meinhard, son of Thorulf?"
"No, noble AEmilius. It had not been wrought had I been present; but here are those who can avouch it. Stand forth, Egilulf, son of Amalrik."
"It needs not," said Verronax. "I acknowledge the deed. The Goth scoffed at us for invoking a created Man. I could not stand by to hear my Master insulted, and I smote him, but in open fight, whereof I bear the token."
"That is true," said Meinhard. "I know that Verronax, the Arvernian, would strike no coward blow. Therefore did I withhold these comrades of Odorik from rushing on thee in their fury; but none the less art thou in feud with Odo, the father of Odorik, who will require of thee either thy blood or the wehrgeld."
"Wehrgeld I have none to pay," returned Verronax, in the same calm voice.
"I have sworn!" said AEmilius in a clear low voice, steady but full of suppressed anguish. A shriek was heard among the women, and Sidonius stepped forth and demanded the amount of wehrgeld.
"That must be for King Euric to decide," returned Meinhard. "He will fix the amount, and it will be for Odo to choose whether he will accept it. The mulct will be high, for the youth was of high Baltic blood, and had but lately arrived with his father from the north!"
"Enough," said Verronax. "Listen, Meinhard. Thou knowest me, and the Arvernian faith. Leave me this night to