ore it open, and ran his eye
over it.

"It is nothing," he said. "Don't disturb me for two hours except on a
matter of great importance. I want to sleep."

Going up to the old armchair of oak that was set before the fire, he
fell on his knees, and covered his eyes and prayed.

"What!" said the man who was watching him up in the rafters. "Does Cain
dare to pray? Surely God will not answer his prayers! He is praying that
he may wipe the English to-morrow from the face of the earth, and again
cement his throne with blood, and forge his sceptre of fire!"

That, no doubt, was what Napoleon prayed for. Yet, when he rose up his
face was wonderfully changed and softened by the religious light which
had shone on it for a few moments. Then, throwing himself into the
armchair, he closed his eyes. And, as the fire burnt low, Rohan Gwenfern
silently descended from the loft, and something gleamed in his hand. He
crept up to the sleeping emperor, and stared at his face, reading it
line by line. Napoleon moved uneasily in his sleep, and murmured to
himself, and his hand opened and shut.

As Rohan raised his knife to strike home to the heart of the tyrant he
saw the hand--white and small, like a woman's or a child's. Again he
looked at the face. Ah, there was no imperial grandeur here! Only a
feeble, sallow, tired, and sickly creature, whom a strong man could
crush down with one blow of his fist. Rohan grew weak as he looked, and
the long knife almost fell from his clutch.

"I must kill him--I must kill him!" he kept saying to himself. "His one
life against the peace and happiness of earth--the life of a Cain! If he
awakens, war will awaken, and fire, famine, and slaughter! Kill him,
Rohan, kill him!"

Perhaps if Napoleon had not prayed before he slept, his enemy would have
carried out his purpose. But he had prayed; his face had become
beautiful for a moment, and he fell asleep as fearlessly as a child. No!
Rohan Gwenfern was not made of the stuff of which savage assassins are
formed; though there was madness in his brain, there was still love in
his heart. He could not kill even Cain, when God had sanctified the
murderer with sleep. God had made Napoleon, and God had sent him; bloody
as he was, he, too, was God's child.

Opening the great casement window of the room in the farmhouse, Gwenfern
gazed for a moment with wild eyes and quivering lips on the pale, worn
face of the great conqueror, and then leaped out into the darkne