he old
priest who had spoken to him before stepped a little in advance
of the rest, and turning, said in a low sentence or two to the
Benedictines; and the group stopped, though one or two still
eyed, it seemed, with sympathy, the man who awaited him. Then the
priest came up alone and put his hand on the arm of the chair.

"Come out this way," he whispered. "There's a path behind,
Monsignor, and I've sent orders for the car to be there."

The man rose obediently (he could do nothing else), passed down
the steps and behind the canopy. A couple of police stood there
in an unfamiliar, but unmistakable uniform, and these drew
themselves up and saluted. They went on down the little pathway
and out through a side-gate. Here again the crowd was tremendous,
but barriers kept them away, and the two passed on together
across the pavement, saluted by half a dozen men who were pressed
against the barriers--(it was here, for the first time, that the
bewildered man noticed that the dresses seemed altogether
unfamiliar)--and up to a car of a peculiar and unknown shape,
that waited in the roadway, with a bare-headed servant, in some
strange purple livery, holding the door open.

"After you, Monsignor," said the old priest.

The other stepped in and sat down. The priest hesitated for an
instant, and then leaned forward into the car.

"You have an appointment in Dean's Yard, Monsignor, you remember.
It's important, you know. Are you too ill?"

"I can't. . . . I can't. . . ." stammered the man.

"Well, at least, we can go round that way. I think we ought, you
know. I can go in and see him for you, if you wish; and we can at
any rate leave the papers."

"Anything, anything. . . . Very well."

The priest got in instantly; the door closed; and the next
moment, through crowds, held back by the police, the great car,
with no driver visible in front through the clear-glass windows,
moved off southward.

(II)

It was a moment before either spoke. The old priest broke the
silence. He was a gentle-faced old man, not unlike a very shrewd
and wide-awake dormouse; and his white hair stood out in a mass
beneath his biretta. But the words he used were unintelligible,
though not altogether unfamiliar.

"I . . . I don't understand, father," stammered the man.

The priest looked at him sharply.

"I was saying," he said slowly and distinctly, "I was saying that
you looked very well, and I was asking you what was the matter."

The