nst the draught.

She thought things over while she warmed her feet. It was clear that
singing did not soften all hearts. Perhaps she did not sing very well.
But the Bishop had said that after one had done a good act one might
pray with hope. She decided to do a good act and then to pray to see her
mother; she would pray also to become a boy so that her father might
care for her. But the Bishop considered it a little late for such a
prayer.

She made terms with the Almighty, sitting on her bed.

"I shall do a good act," she said, "on this the birthday of Thy Son, and
after that I shall ask for the thing Thou knowest of."

After much thinking, she decided to free the Jew. And being, after all,
her father's own child, she acted at once.

It was a matter of many cold stone steps and much fumbling with bars.
But Guillem the gaoler had crept up to the hall and lay sleeping by the
fire, with a dozen dogs about him. It was the time of the Truce of God,
and vigilance was relaxed. Also Guillem was in love with a girl of the
village and there was talk that the _seigneur_, in his loneliness, had
seen that she was beautiful. So Guillem slept to forget, and the Jew
lay awake because of rats and anxiety.

The Jew rose from the floor when Clotilde threw the grating open, and
blinked at her with weary and gentle eyes.

"It is the birthday of our Lord," said Clotilde, "and I am doing a good
deed so that I may see my mother again. But go quickly." Then she
remembered something the Bishop had said to her, and eyed him
thoughtfully as he stared at her.

"But you do not love our Lord!"

The Jew put out his foot quietly so that she could not close the
grating again. But he smiled into her eyes.

"Your Lord was a Jew," he said.

This reassured her. It seemed to double the quality of mercy. She threw
the door wide and the usurer went out cautiously, as if suspecting a
trap. But patches of sunlight, barred with black, showed the way clear.
He should have gone at once, but he waited to give her the blessing of
his people. Even then, having started, he went back to her. She looked
so small in that fearsome place.

"If there is something you wish, little maid, and I can secure it for
you--"

"I wish but two things," she said. "I wish to be a boy, only I fear it
is too late for that. The Bishop thinks so. And I wish to see my
mother."

And these being beyond his gift, and not contained in the pack he had
fastened to his shoulders