stian. I would be baptized."

"Fearest thou not thy people?" the monk asked.

"I fear not death," answered the boy simply.

"Come with me."

Trembling, the woman followed them both, and all were lost in the gloom
of the church. They were not to be seen, and all was still for a space.
Suddenly a clear voice broke the silence.

"_Ego baptizo te in nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti._"

Then the woman and the boy were standing again without the entrance in
the chilly air, and the ancient monk was upon the threshold under the
carved arch; his thin hands, white in the darkness, were lifted high,
and he blessed them, and they went their way.

In the moving vision the radiance was brighter still and illuminated the
streets as they moved on. Then a cloud descended over all, and certain
days and weeks passed, and again the boy was walking swiftly toward
the church. But the woman was not with him, and he believed that he was
alone, though the messengers of evil were upon him. Two dark figures
moved in the shadow, silent, noiseless in their walk, muffled in long
garments. He went on, no longer deigning to look back, beyond fear as he
had ever been, and beyond even the expectation of a danger. He went into
the church, and the two men made gestures, and spoke in low tones, and
hid themselves in the shade of the buttresses outside.

The vision grew darker and a terrible stillness was over everything, for
the church was not opened to the sight this time. There was a horror of
long waiting with the certainty of what was to come. The narrow street
was empty to the eye, and yet there was the knowledge of evil presence,
of two strong men waiting in the dark to take their victim to the place
of expiation. And the horror grew in the silence and the emptiness,
until it was unbearable.

The door opened and the boy was with the monk under the black arch.
The old man embraced him and blessed him and stood still for a moment
watching him as he went down. Then he, also, turned and went back, and
the door was closed.

Swiftly the two men glided from their hiding-place and sped along the
uneven pavement. The boy paused and faced them, for he felt that he was
taken. They grasped him by the arms on each side, Lazarus his father,
and Levi, surnamed the Short-handed, the strongest and the cruellest and
the most relentless of the younger rabbis. Their grip was rough, and the
older man held a coarse woollen cloth in his hand with whic