ever
bring him within the circuit of the walls above? It was now that a
startling incident turned those misgivings almost into actual fear.
From the steep slope a heavy mass of stone was detached, after some
whisperings among the trees above his head, and rushing down through
the stillness fell to pieces in a [166] cloud of dust across the road
just behind him, so that he felt the touch upon his heel. That was
sufficient, just then, to rouse out of its hiding-place his old vague
fear of evil--of one's "enemies"--a distress, so much a matter of
constitution with him, that at times it would seem that the best
pleasures of life could but be snatched, as it were hastily, in one
moment's forgetfulness of its dark, besetting influence. A sudden
suspicion of hatred against him, of the nearness of "enemies," seemed
all at once to alter the visible form of things, as with the child's
hero, when he found the footprint on the sand of his peaceful, dreamy
island. His elaborate philosophy had not put beneath his feet the
terror of mere bodily evil; much less of "inexorable fate, and the
noise of greedy Acheron."

The resting-place to which he presently came, in the keen, wholesome
air of the market-place of the little hill-town, was a pleasant
contrast to that last effort of his journey. The room in which he sat
down to supper, unlike the ordinary Roman inns at that day, was trim
and sweet. The firelight danced cheerfully upon the polished,
three-wicked lucernae burning cleanly with the best oil, upon the
white-washed walls, and the bunches of scarlet carnations set in glass
goblets. The white wine of the place put before him, of the true
colour and flavour of the grape, and with a ring of delicate foam as it
mounted in the cup, had a reviving edge or freshness he had [167] found
in no other wine. These things had relieved a little the melancholy of
the hour before; and it was just then that he heard the voice of one,
newly arrived at the inn, making his way to the upper floor--a youthful
voice, with a reassuring clearness of note, which completed his cure.

He seemed to hear that voice again in dreams, uttering his name: then,
awake in the full morning light and gazing from the window, saw the
guest of the night before, a very honourable-looking youth, in the rich
habit of a military knight, standing beside his horse, and already
making preparations to depart. It happened that Marius, too, was to
take that day's journey