Such were the intentions of the conspirator, when he first addressed Paullus. His desire to increase the strength of his party, to whom the accession of any member however humble of the great house of Cæcilii could not fail to be useful, alone prompting him in the first instance. But, when he saw by the young man’s startled aspect that he was prepossessed against him, and had listened probably to the damning rumors which were rife everywhere concerning him, a second motive was added, in his pride of seduction and sophistry, by which he was wont to boast, that he could bewilder the strongest minds, and work them to his will. When by the accidental disarrangement of Arvina’s gown, and the discovery of his own dagger, he perceived that the intended victim of his specious arts was probably cognizant in some degree of his last night’s crime, a third and stronger cause was added, in the instinct of self-preservation. And as soon as he found out that Paullus was bound for the house of Cicero, he considered his life, in some sort, staked upon the issue of his attempt on Arvina’s principles. No part could have been played with more skill, or with greater knowledge of his character whom he addressed. He said just enough to set him thinking, and to give a bias and a colour to his thoughts, without giving him reason to suspect that he had any interest in the matter; and he had withdrawn himself in that careless and half contemptuous manner, which naturally led the young man to wish for a renewal of the subject. And in fact Paul, while walking down the hill, toward the house of the Consul, was busied in wondering why Cataline had left so much unsaid, departing so abruptly; and in debating with himself upon the strange doctrines which he had then for the first time heard broached. It was about the second hour of the Roman day, corresponding nearly to eight o’clock before noon—as the winter solstice was now passed—when Arvina reached the magnificent dwelling of the Consul in the Carinæ at the angle of the Cærolian place, hard by the foot of the Sacred Way. This splendid building occupied a whole _insula_, as it was called, or space between four streets, intersecting each other at right angles; and was three stories in height, the two upper supported by columns of marble, with a long range of glass windows, at that period an unusual and expensive luxury. The doors stood wide open; and on either hand the vestibule were arranged the lictors leaning upon their fasces, while the whole space of the great Corinthian hall within, lighted from above, and adorned with vast black pillars of Lucullean marble, was crowded with the white robes of the consul’s plebeian clients tendering their morning salutations; not unmixed with the crimson fringes and broad crimson facings of senatorial visitors.