And then, presently, as he moved to and fro in restless search for her, it appeared to him that a rose-red gleam of silk, a just perceptible whiteness of muslin and lace, the faintest vision of a vision of her sweet and lovely face, moved beside him as he moved. It was as though an indefinable tenderness yearned towards him from out some impassable distance, striving to declare itself, to make itself seen and felt, yet without force to master some opposing influence and accomplish its object. And this awoke in Laurence not only an answering tenderness, but an answering struggle. He stood quite still, yet with every nerve, every faculty strained to attain and overcome. He felt braced by a sudden exhilaration of battle. Silently, fiercely, he fought with some awful, unseen enemy,--with dimly apprehended powers of time and place, of death, of things spiritual and things material, which intervened between him and the love which sought to reach him. Never had he desired anything as he desired this love. His individuality was actual enough now; and his whole body ached with the effort to penetrate that resistant medium, to be face to face with that love, and look on it, and so doing to read the riddle both of his future and his past. But when the warfare was at its height, and the unseen enemy seemed to yield a little, while the slender form of his rose-clad lady grew more distinct to Laurence's eyes, unaccustomed noise and confusion arose within the dead-quiet house. Doors opened and slammed, as with the hurry of panic. Men's footsteps echoed imperatively down the corridors and upon the stairs.--Another moment and he would overcome all resistance, and his dear companion would stand before him, smiling, gracious, full of consolation and of help; but just then voices were raised in quick discussion without. Suddenly the door was thrown open. Upon the threshold was Renshaw the butler, bereft of his usual correctness of demeanour, his eyes starting, his skin mottled with purple stains. Behind him stood Watkins holding back the leather-lined curtain to the utmost of its length, thereby disclosing a triangular vista of dark-panelled passage and the proud heads and arrogant, impassive faces of the rulers of Imperial Rome. Evidently both men dreaded to venture one step further into the room. "Will you please to come at once, sir," Renshaw called hoarsely. "Excuse me, sir, you are wanted. Mr. Rivers is very ill. He has asked for you. Mr. Lowndes fears he is dying." XVI