“I’ve been investigating Almo,” he said, “and I am more than pleased with all I can learn of him. I see no reason for not telling you that, from the very day you were taken as a Vestal, some of the most expert, secret and trustworthy men in the employ of the information department have had no other duties than to keep close watch upon you and Almo. I have been over all the papers relating to him and to you, I have talked with the men themselves. They all assure me that never once have you and Almo met since he reached your father’s house a half hour too late. They also report that, in the course of his injudicious moonings about your haunts, he has always kept at a respectful distance. And except for those same loverly danglings about places where he might catch glimpses of you, I can find nothing against the lad. Everybody speaks most highly of him. His former tutors and preceptors are enthusiastic in their laudations of his capacities, abilities, diligence and attainments in all matters pertaining to books and study. About Falerii he was regarded as a fine specimen of a young nobleman, huntsman and swimmer, good at all rustic sports, as haughty as the proudest when he was given good cause to assert himself, but habitually affable, unassuming and sunny tempered. Towards his father’s tenants and slaves he was most kindly and nothing could be more to any man’s credit than his downright heroic behavior from the very day the pestilence appeared on his estates, all through the frightful period of its raging about Falerii, until the neighborhood had somewhat recovered after the plague had abated. “The most extraordinary feature of the reports about him is that they all agree as to his amazing devotion to you. All persons who know him or know of him are unanimous in the opinion that he has never taken the slightest personal interest in any human being except yourself; all are emphatic in stating that he has certainly never manifested any affection for anyone else. This is unprecedented. I never heard of such another case. There is nothing astonishing about a young Roman declaring that he would remain unmarried for thirty years in order to mate, ultimately, with the girl of his choice. There is nothing wonderful about his keeping his word. But any other youth I ever heard of would have consoled himself variously, and variedly. Almo’s austere celibacy is a portent in our world and altogether marvellous. It lifts his affair with you out of the humdrum atmosphere of to-day and puts it on a level with the legendary stories of heroic times, with the life-long fidelities of the Milesian tales.