He thought of Antonina, solitary and helpless, listening to the tempest in affright, and watching vainly for his long-delayed approach.

His fancy arrayed before him dangers, plots, and crimes, robed in all the horrible exaggerations of a dream.

Even the quick, monotonous dripping of the rain-drops outside aroused within him dark and indefinable forebodings of ill.

The passion that had hitherto created for him new pleasures was now fulfilling the other half of its earthly mission, and causing him new pains.
As the storm strengthened, as the darkness lowered deeper and deeper, so did his inquietude increase, until at length it mastered the last feeble resistance of his wavering firmness.

Persuading himself that, after having delayed so long, Goisvintha would now refrain from seeking him until the morrow, and that all communications from Alaric, had they been despatched, would have reached him ere this; unable any longer to combat his anxiety for the safety of Antonina; determined to risk the worst possibilities rather than be absent at such a time of tempest and peril from the farm-house, he made a last visit to the stations of the watchful sentinels, and quitted the camp for the night..