ek, very bright in the fire-glow, and glistening
like the fairest gems.

"Master--O master!" cried Roger, "dost grieve thee for Sir Fidelis?"

"Forsooth, I must, Roger--he was a peerless friend, methinks!"

"Aye master, and--noble lady!"

"Roger--O Roger, how learned you this? Speak!"

"Lord, thou hast had visions and talked much within thy sickness. So do
I know that thou dost love the Duchess Helen that men do call 'the
Beautiful.' I do know that on thy marriage night thou wert snatched
away to shameful prison. I do know that she, because her heart was as
great as her love, did follow thee in knightly guise, and thou did most
ungently drive her from thee. All this, and much beside, thou didst
shout and whisper in thy fever."

Quoth Beltane, plucking at Roger with feeble hand:

"Roger--O Roger, since this thou knowest--tell me, tell me, can faith
and treachery lie thus within one woman's heart--and of all women--
her's?"

"Master, can white be black? Can day be night? Can heaven be hell--or
can truth lie? So, an Sir Fidelis be faithful (and faithful forsooth is
he) so is the Duchess Helen faithful--"

"Nay, an she be true--O Roger, an she be true indeed, how think you of
the treachery, of--"

"I think here was witchcraft, master, spells, see'st thou, and magic
black and damned. As thou wert true to her, so was she true to thee, as
true as--aye, as true as I am, and true am I, Saint Cuthbert knoweth
that, who hath heard my prayers full oft of late, master."

"Now God bless thee, Roger--O, God bless thee!" So crying, of a sudden
Beltane caught Black Roger's sun-burned hand and kissed it, and
thereafter turned him to the shadows. And, lying thus, Beltane wept,
very bitterly yet very silent, until, like a grieving child he had wept
himself to forgetfulness and sleep. So slept he, clasped within Roger's
mailed arm. But full oft Black Roger lifted his bronzed right hand--the
hand that had felt Beltane's sudden kiss--and needs must he view it
with eyes of wonder, as if it had been indeed some holy thing, what
time he kept his midnight vigil beside the fire.

CHAPTER XLVI

HOW BLACK ROGER PRAYED IN THE DAWN: AND HOW HIS PRAYERS WERE ANSWERED

"Holy Saint Cuthbert, art a very sweet and potent saint, and therefore
hast good eyes--which is well; so canst thou see him for thyself, how
weak he is and languid, that was a mighty man and lusty. Cherish him, I
pray thee! A goodly youth thou dost know him, thou di