method of ridding yourself of these agonies....
I proposed the method to you.... I am ready to apply it."

"Take care! No violence upon him! Your life answers to me for his!"

"What are your intentions?"

"I do not know what to decide upon.... One moment I wish him to undergo
a thousand deaths ... the next I am ready to fall at his knees, and ask
pardon.... I am out of my mind ... out of my mind with love!" And the
abbess wrung her hands, bit into the cushions of the lounge, and tore
them with her nails in savage fury. Suddenly rising, her eyes wet with
tears and glistening with passion, she cried: "Give me the key of
Berthoald's prison!"

"It is on this bunch," answered the intendant pointing to several keys
that hung from his belt.

"Give me that one quick!"

"Here it is," said the intendant, detaching a large iron key from the
bunch. Meroflede took the key, contemplated it in silence, and fell into
a revery.

"Madam," said Ricarik, "I shall order the messenger in waiting to depart
with your letter to the Bishop of Nantes."

"Go.... Go.... Take the letter and return!"

"I shall also take a look at the old goldsmith's shop.... He is to cast
the large silver vase to-day!"

"Oh! What do I care!"

"There is a vague suspicion in my mind. I imagined this morning I
noticed a sign of embarrassment on the face of the wily old man. He told
me he was to lock himself in the whole day. I suspect he has a plot with
his apprentices to pilfer a portion of the metal. He also notified me
the casting would not commence until night. I wish to see how it is
done. I shall then come back, madam. Have you any other orders for me,
my abbess?"

Meroflede remained plunged in revery, holding in her hand the key of
Amael's prison. After a few seconds of silence, and without raising her
eyes that remained fixed upon the floor, she said to the intendant:

"When you go out, tell Madeleine to bring me my cloak and a lighted
lamp."

"Your cloak, madam? Do you expect to go out? Do you need it to go to
Berthoald in his prison----?"

Meroflede interrupted the intendant by stamping her foot in a rage, and
pointed him to the door with an imperious gesture, saying:

"Begone, vile slave!"

CHAPTER XI.

THE FLIGHT.

Bonaik, his apprentices, Rosen-Aer, and Septimine, confined since
morning in the workshop, had impatiently waited for night. Everything
was in readiness for the escape of Amael from the cavern when darkness
shou