Into the Atrium Vestae swarmed the people, howling, shouting, praising the goddess, fighting one another--every man imagining his neighbour a cutthroat and abductor.
Agias stood bearing up Fabia in his arms; she was pale as the driven snow.

Her lips moved, but no sound passed from them.

Fonteia, the old Maxima, with her white hair tumbling over her shoulders, was still huddled in one corner, groaning and moaning in a paroxysm of unreasoning terror, without dignity or self-control.

A frightened maid had touched the torch to the tall candelabra, and the room blazed with a score of lights; while in at the doorway pressed the multitude--the mob of low tapsters, brutal butchers, coarse pedlers, and drunkards just staggering from their cups.

The scene was one of pandemonium.
Dumnorix lay prone on a costly rug, whose graceful patterns were being dyed to a hideous crimson; over one divan lay a brigand--struggling in the last agony of a mortal wound.