The beauty and virtue of Lucretia had fired the evil passions of Sextus Tarquinius. A few days later he returned to Collatia, where he was hospitably received by Lucretia as her husband's kinsman. In the dead of night, he stealthily entered her chamber with a drawn sword. He forced her to yield to his sexual advances by telling her the alternative was that he would kill her and one of her slaves, place their bodies together, and claim he had defended her husband's honour when he caught her having adulterous sex.