her. I wish I were with
them, while others were reforming Holland."

"But thy mother and thy sweetheart, since they got into the hands of
Oberthal, are doubtless dead."

"Then there is little for me to fight for. I shall stop now; do you
carry on your schemes as best you may. Who is that prisoner?" he
asked, as Oberthal was brought back by the soldiers.

"It is a man who is about to be executed."

"Oh--he is? Who says so, since I say otherwise?" John replied, looking
at Zacharia contemptuously. "I am thy Prophet," he declared with
hardly less contempt in his tone than before. "I am thy Prophet and
settle these matters of life and death. I settle this one. Yonder man
shall not die. I am in a humane mood." He motioned the guard to bring
Oberthal, whom he had not yet seen, before him. When face to face,
John of Leyden lifted his eyes and looked again upon the man who had
brought all his woes upon him; who had so persecuted him that he had
in a mad moment left his peaceful inn, and undertaken to change the
face of Germany. He had already wrought untold pain and suffering.

"Oberthal!" he said, hardly able to speak because of his emotion.

"Ah! thou wilt still treat him tenderly, I doubt not!" Zacharia cried,
sneeringly. For a moment John of Leyden could not speak; then he said:

"Leave us!" His tone was awful, yet showed great self-repression.

"So!" he said, after gazing at Oberthal a moment. "Heaven has
delivered thee into my hands!"

"It is just. My crime merits my punishment," Oberthal said in a low
voice. "But I will tell thee one thing which is thy due and may save
my soul from damnation: thy Bertha, to save herself from my hands,
threw herself into the sea, and thus escaped me."

"Dead, dead!" John of Leyden said, bowing his head a moment upon his
hands.

"No! there is more. Touched with remorse, I saved her."

"And then,--speak!"

"She fled to Muenster, and I was on my way there to find her and to try
to restore her to thee, when I was arrested."

"Oberthal, thy fate shall rest with her. I spare thee till she shall
pronounce sentence upon thee." He had no sooner spoken than Mathison
rushed in and cried that the troops had rebelled, and that John alone
could stop the riot and stay the ruin. "The gates of Muenster have
been thrown open, its army has marched upon us, and our men are
fleeing."

"Run! run!" John of Leyden shouted. "After them, and turn them back.
Muenster must be ours!" And he rushed o