d but wonderfully fitted together, and warm and bright
with the driftwood fire, though I heard the spray rattle on the
roof of flat stones, and the wind howled strangely around the
walls. Both ends of this house were of the living rock of the sides
of the gorge, and at one end seemed to be a sort of cave with a
narrow entrance.

The man who had bidden me in stood yet at the open door looking out
on his staircase, but he did not bide there long. With a sigh he
turned and closed the door and came in, hardly looking at me, but
turning toward the cave I had just noticed. He was an old man, very
old indeed, with a long white beard and pale face lined with
countless wrinkles, and he stooped a little as he walked. But his
face was calm and kind, though he did not smile at me, and I felt
that here I was safe with one of no common sort.

"Come, my son," he said, "it is the hour of prime. Glad am I to
have one with me after many days."

He waited for no answer, and I followed him for the few steps that
led to the rock cavern; and there was a tiny oratory with its altar
and cross, and wax lights already burning.

The old man knelt in his place and I knelt with him, and as he
began the office straightway I knew how worn out I was, and of a
sudden the lights danced before me and I reeled and fell with a
clatter and clash of arms on the rocky floor. I seemed to know that
the old man turned and looked and rose up from his knees hastily,
and I tried to say that I was sorry that I had broken the peace of
this holy place; but he answered in his soft voice:

"Why, poor lad, I should have seen that you were spent ere this.
The fault is mine."

He raised me gently, and seemed to search me for some wound. And as
he did so I came more to myself, and begged him to go on with his
office.

"First comes care of the afflicted, my son, and after that may be
prayer. In truth, to help the fainting is in itself a prayer, as I
think. Come to the fireside and tell me what is amiss."

"Fasting and fighting and freezing, father," I said, trying to
laugh.

"Are you wounded?" he asked quickly.

"No, not at all."

"That is well. It is a brave heart that will jest in such a case as
yours, for you are ice from head to foot. Well, I had better hear
your story, if you will tell it me, in the daylight. Now get those
wet garments off you and put on this. I will get you food, and you
shall sleep."

This was surely the last place where my foes woul