d tell you to-morrow."

"Find out also, if it pleases you, learned Basil," said Hugh, "whether
or no this knight with the three names is still in Avignon. If so, I
have a word or two to say to him."

"I will, I will," answered the lantern-jawed notary. "Yet I think it
most unlikely that any one who can buy or beg a horse to ride away on
should stay in this old city just now, unless indeed, the laws of his
order bind him to do so that he may minister to the afflicted. Well,
if the pest spares me and you, to-morrow morning I will be back here at
this hour to tell you all that I can gather."

"How did this sickness begin in Avignon?" asked Grey Dick.

"Noble Squire, none know for certain. In the autumn we had great rains,
heavy mists and other things contrary to the usual course of nature,
such as strange lights shining in the heavens, and so forth. Then after
a day of much heat, one evening a man clad in a red and yellow cap, who
wore a cloak of thick black furs and necklaces of black pearls, was
seen standing in the market-place. Indeed, I saw him myself. There was
something so strange and dreadful about the appearance of this
man, although it is true that some say he was no more than a common
mountebank arrayed thus to win pence, that the people set upon him.
They hurled stones at him, they attacked him with swords and every other
weapon, and thought that they had killed him, when suddenly he appeared
outside the throng unhurt. Then he stretched out his white-gloved hand
toward them and melted into the gloom.

"Only," added Basil nervously, "it was noted afterward that all those
who had tried to injure the man were among the first to die of the pest.
Thank God, I was not one of them. Indeed I did my best to hold them
back, which, perhaps, is the reason why I am alive to-day."

"A strange story," said Hugh, "though I have heard something like it in
other cities through which we have passed. Well, till to-morrow at this
hour, friend Basil."

"We have learned two things, master," said Dick, when the lawyer had
bowed himself out. "First, that Acour is, or has been, in Avignon, and
secondly, that Murgh the Messenger, Murgh the Sword, has been or is in
Avignon. Let us go seek for one of the other of them, since for my part
I desire to meet them both."

So all that day they sought but found neither.

Next morning Basil reappeared, according to his promise, and informed
them that their business was on foot. Also he sa