ship. The Abbe was frozen with horror; there was no room in his
breast for the lesser emotion of fear; indeed, the horror was so great
and all-absorbing as to charm and hold him spellbound. He could not
remove his eyes from the thirteenth, who stood before him calmly, with a
faint smile playing over his intellectual and aristocratic face--a smile
which only added to the intensity of the despair gleaming in his clear
blue eyes. Gerard was struck first with the sadness, then with the
beauty, and then with the intellectual vigor of that marvellous
countenance. The expression was not unkind: haughtiness and pride could
be read only in the high-bred features, short upper lip, and nobly
moulded limbs; for the face betokened, save for the flush upon the
cheeks, only great sadness. The eyes were fixed upon those of Gerard,
and he felt their soft, subtle, intense light penetrate into every nook
and cranny of his soul and being. This being simply stood and gazed upon
the priest as the worshippers grew more wild, more blasphemous, more
cruel. The Abbe could think of nothing but the face before him, and the
great desolation that lay folded over it as a veil. He could think of no
prayer, although he could remember there were prayers. Was this
despair--the despair of a man drowning in sight of land--being shed
into him from the sad blue eyes? Was it despair, or was it death? Ah,
no; not death. Death was peaceful, and this was violent and lively. Was
there no refuge, no mercy, no salvation anywhere? Perhaps, but he could
not remember while those sad blue eyes still gazed upon him. He could
not remember, and still he could not entirely forget. He felt that help
would come to him if he sought it, and yet he could hardly tell how to
seek it. Moreover, by degrees the blue eyes--it seemed as if their
color, their great blueness, had some fearful power--began pouring into
him a more hideous pleasure. It was the ecstasy of great pain, becoming
a delight, the ecstasy of being beyond all hope and of being thus
enabled to look with scorn upon the author of hope. The blue eyes still
gazed sadly with a soft smile of despair upon him. Gerard knew that in
another moment he would not sink, faint, or fall, but that he would--oh,
much worse!--he would smile. At this very instant a name--a familiar
name, and one which the infernal worshippers had made frequent use of,
but which he had never remarked before--struck his ear; the name of
Christ. Where had h