n, under the protection of two
enormous cats and a British terrier. A silver bell stood ready to his hand,
should the aid of the attendant chamberlains be requisite. The walls had
been divested of their tapestries, and the floor gleamed with pounded
glass. A tome of legendary lore lay open at the history of the Piper of
Hamelin. All was silence, save for the sniffing and scratching of the dog
and a sound of subterranean scraping and gnawing.

"Why tarries Cardinal Barbadico thus?" the Pope at last asked himself
aloud. The inquiry was answered by a wild burst of squeaking and clattering
and scurrying to and fro, as who should say, "We've eaten him! We've eaten
him!"

But this exultation was at least premature, for just as the terrified Pope
clutched his bell, the door opened to the narrowest extent compatible with
the admission of an ecclesiastical personage of dignified presence, and
Cardinal Barbadico hastily squeezed himself through.

"I shall hardly trust myself upon these stairs again," he remarked, "unless
under the escort of your Holiness's terrier."

"Take him, my son, and a cruse of holy water to boot," the Pope responded.
"Now, how go things in the city?"

"As ill as may be, your Holiness. Not a saint stirs a finger to help us.
The country-folk shun the city, the citizens seek the country. The
multitude of enemies increases hour by hour. They set at defiance the
anathemas fulminated by your Holiness, the spiritual censures placarded in
the churches, and the citation to appear before the ecclesiastical courts,
although assured that their cause shall be pleaded by the ablest advocates
in Rome. The cats, amphibious with alarm, are taking to the Tiber. Vainly
the city reeks with toasted cheese, and the Commissary-General reports
himself short of arsenic."

"And how are the people taking it?" demanded Alexander. "To what cause do
they attribute the public calamity?"

"Generally speaking, to the sins of your Holiness," replied the Cardinal.

"Cardinal!" exclaimed Alexander indignantly.

"I crave pardon for my temerity," returned Barbadico. "It is with
difficulty that I force myself to speak, but I am bound to lay the
ungrateful truth before your Holiness. The late Pope, as all men know, was
a personage of singular sanctity."

"Far too upright for this fallen world," observed Alexander with unction.

"I will not dispute," responded the Cardinal, "that the head of Innocent
the Eleventh might have been more