horror upon me. Tell me," she implored again, "what does it mean?"

I drew her away now, promising to satisfy her in the fullest manner once
she were out of these forbidding surroundings. I led her to the sacristy
and seating her upon the settle I produced that wine-skin once again.

At first she babbled like a child of not being thirsty; but I was
insistent.

"It is no matter of quenching thirst, Madonna," I told her. "The wine
will warm and revive you. Come Madonna mia, drink."

She obeyed me now, and having got the first gulp down her throat she
drank a lusty draught that was not long in bringing a healthier colour
to replace the ashen pallor of her cheeks.

"I am so cold, Lazzaro," she complained.

I turned to the drawer in which I had espied the rough monks' habits,
and pulling one out I held it for her to don. She sat there now, in that
garment of coarse black cloth, the cowl flung back upon her shoulder,
the fairest postulate that ever entered upon a novitiate.

"You are good to me, Lazzaro," she murmured plaintively, "and I have
used you very ill." She paused a second, passing her hand across her
brow. Then--"What is the hour?" she asked.

It was a question that I left unheeded. I bade her brace herself and
have courage for the tale I was to tell. I assured her that the horror
of it was all passed and that she had naught to fear. So soon as her
natural curiosity should be satisfied it should be hers to return to her
brother at the Palace.

"But how came I thence?" she cried. "I must have lain in a swoon, for
I remember nothing." And then her swift mind, leaping to a reasonable
conclusion; and assisted, perhaps, by the memory of the shattered
catafalque which she had seen--"Did they account me dead, Lazzaro?" she
asked of a sudden, her eyes dilating with a curious affright as they
were turned upon my own.

"Yes, Madonna," answered I, "you were accounted dead." And, with that, I
told her the entire story of what had befallen, saving only that I left
my own part unmentioned, nor sought to explain my opportune presence
in the church. When I spoke of the coming of Ramiro and his knaves she
shuddered and closed her eyes in very awe. At length, when I had done,
she opened them again, and again she turned them full upon me. Their
brightness seemed to increase a moment, and then I saw that she was
quietly weeping.

"And you were there to save me, Lazzaro?" she murmured brokenly.
"Lazzaro mio, it seems that y