here, to plot fresh
murders--perhaps our own and our boy's. Oh!" he added savagely, "till
my hands are about his throat and my dagger is in his heart there's no
peace for me, who have a score to pay and you both to guard."

Cicely knew not what to answer; indeed, when this mood was on him it
was hard to reason with Christopher, who had suffered so fearfully, and,
like herself, been saved but by a miracle or the mandate of Heaven.

Of a sudden a hush fell upon the place. The blackbirds ceased their
winter chatter in the laurels; it grew so still that they heard a dead
leaf drop to the ground. The night was at hand. One last red ray from
the set sun struck across the frosty sky and was reflected to the earth.
In the light of that ray Christopher's trained eyes caught the gleam of
something white that moved in the shadow of the beech tree where they
sat. Like a tiger he sprang at it, and the next moment haled out a man.

"Look," he said, twisting the head of his captive so that the glow fell
on it. "Look; I have the snake. Ah! Wife, you saw nothing, but I saw
him, and here he is at last--at last!"

"The Abbot!" gasped Cicely.

The Abbot it was indeed, but oh! how changed. His plump, olive-coloured
countenance had shrunk to that of a skeleton still covered by yellow
skin, in which the dark eyes rolled bloodshot and unnaturally large.
His tonsure and jaws showed a growth of stubbly grey hair, his frame had
become weak and small, his soft and delicate hands resembled those of a
woman dead of some wasting disease, and, like his garments, were clogged
with dirt. The mail shirt he wore hung loose upon him; one of his shoes
was gone, and the toes peeped through his stockinged foot. He was but a
living misery.

"Deliver your arms," growled Christopher, shaking him as a terrier
shakes a rat, "or you die. Do you yield? Answer!"

"How can he," broke in Cicely, "when you have him by the throat?"

Christopher loosed his grip of the man's windpipe, and instead seized
his wrists, whereon the Abbot drew a great breath, for he was almost
choked, and fell to his knees, in weakness, not in supplication.

"I came to you for mercy," he said presently, "but, having overheard
your talk, know that I can hope for none. Indeed, why should I, who
showed none, and whose great cause seems dead, that cause for which I
fought and lived? Let me die with it. I ask no more. Still, you are a
gentleman, and therefore I beg a favour of you. Do not ha