as she was known. Two eunuchs at a wicked
door spat as she passed; she saw the feet of a murdered man sticking out
of a drain, the scurry of a little troop of rats. Mostly, the dogs of
the city had it to themselves. No women were about, but here and there a
guarded light betrayed sin still awake, and here and there a bell,
calling the faithful to church, sounded a homely note of peace. The
morning was desperately close, without a waft of air. She found the
Abbot Milo at his lodging, in the act of setting off to mass at the
church of Saint Martha. The sight of her wild face stopped him.

'No time to lose, my child,' he said, when he had heard her. 'We must go
to the Queen: it is due to her. Saviour of mankind!' he cried with
flacking arms, 'for what wast Thou content to lay down Thy life!' They
hurried out together just as the sun broke upon the tiles of the domed
churches, and Acre began to creep out of bed.

The Queen was not yet risen, but sent them word that she would receive
the abbot, 'but on no account Madame de Saint-Pol.' Jehane pushed off
the insult just as she pushed her hot hair from her face. She had no
thoughts to spare for herself. The abbot went into the Queen's house.

Berengere looked very drowned, he thought, in her great bed. One saw a
sharp white oval floating in the black clouds which were her hair. She
looked younger than any bride could be, childish, a child ill of a
fever, wilful, querulous, miserable. All the time she listened to what
Milo had to say her lips twitched, and her fingers plucked gold threads
out of the cherubim on the coverlet.

'Kill the King of England? Kill my lord' Montferrat? Eh, they cannot
kill him! Oh, oh, oh!'--she moaned shudderingly--'I would that they
could! Then perhaps I should sleep o' nights.' Her strained eyes pierced
him for an answer. What answer could he give?

'My news is authentic, Madame. I came at once, as my duty was, to your
Grace, as to the proper person--' Here she sat right up in her bed,
wide-eyed, all alight.

'Yes, yes, I am the proper person. I will do it, if no other can. Virgin
Mary!'--she stretched her arms out, like one crucified--'Look at me. Am
I worthy of this?' If she addressed the Virgin Mary her invitation was
pointedly to the abbot, a less proper spectator. He did look, however,
and pitied her deeply; at her lips dry with hatred, which should have
been freshly kissed, at her drawn cheeks, into her amazed young heart:
eh, God, he kne