"I wished to release them now. But Zazo has my promise, and he could
not be softened."

"He is right,--a rare instance," said Verus.

"What? You, the priest, counsel against pity and pardon?" asked Hilda,
in astonishment.

"I am also chancellor of this kingdom. The former King would be far too
dangerous if he were set at liberty. Romans, Catholics,--he is said
secretly to have joined this church,--might gather round him, and 'the
rightful King of the Vandals' would be a much-desired weapon against
the 'Tyrant' Gelimer. The prisoners will be better off where they are.
Their lives are safe--"

"They have repeatedly requested an audience; they wish to justify
themselves. These petitions--"

"Were always granted. I have heard them myself."

"What resulted from them?"

"Nothing that I did not already know. Did you not feel the armor under
Hilderic's robe, wrest the dagger from his hand yourself?"

"Alas, yes! Yet I so easily distrust myself. Ambition, desire for this
crown (one of my heaviest sins), made me only too ready to believe in
Hilderic's guilt. And now the captive King, protesting his innocence,
appealing to a warning letter received by him on that day, which would
explain and prove everything, requests another trial. Yet you have
fulfilled the prisoner's wish and searched for it in the place he
named?"

"Certainly," said Verus, quietly, his lifeless features growing even
more rigid, more sternly controlled. "That letter is an invention. As
Hilderic repeatedly asserted that he had concealed it in a secret
drawer of 'Genseric's Golden Chest,'--you know the coffer, Gibamund?--I
searched the whole chest with my own hands and alone. I even found the
secret drawer and opened it; nothing of the kind was there. Nay, at the
prisoner's earnest entreaties, I had the coffer carried to his dungeon
and examined by himself in the presence of witnesses. He, too, found
nothing."

"And no one could have previously removed the letter?" asked Gelimer.

"You and I alone have the keys to the chest which contains the most
important documents. But I must leave you now," said the priest. "I
have many letters to write to-night. Farewell!"

"I thank you, my Verus. May the angel of the Lord watch over me in
Heaven as faithfully as you watch and care for me on earth."

The priest closed his eyes a moment, then smiling faintly, nodded,
saying: "That is my prayer also."

He glided noiselessly across the threshold.