drink of this joyful cup
with a chastened and a fearful spirit. Nor is it wonderful that even in
the hour of his triumph Foy's buoyant and hopeful nature was chilled by
the shadow of her fears and the forebodings of his own heart.

When Lysbeth parted from Elsa that afternoon she went straight to
the chamber of the Vrouw Jansen. It was a poor place, for after the
execution of her husband his wretched widow had been robbed of all
her property and now existed upon the charity of her co-religionists.
Lysbeth found her in bed, an old woman nursing her, who said that she
thought the patient was suffering from a fever. Lysbeth leant over the
bed and kissed the sick woman, but started back when she saw that the
glands of her neck were swollen into great lumps, while the face was
flushed and the eyes so bloodshot as to be almost red. Still she knew
her visitor, for she whispered:

"What is the matter with me, Vrouw van Goorl? Is it the smallpox coming
on? Tell me, friend, the doctor would not speak."

"I fear that it is worse; it is the plague," said Lysbeth, startled into
candour.

The poor girl laughed hoarsely. "Oh! I hoped it," she said. "I am glad,
I am glad, for now I shall die and go to join him. But I wish that I
had caught it before," she rambled on to herself, "for then I would have
taken it to him in prison and they couldn't have treated him as they
did." Suddenly she seemed to come to herself, for she added, "Go away,
Vrouw van Goorl, go quickly or you may catch my sickness."

"If so, I am afraid that the mischief is done, for I have kissed you,"
answered Lysbeth. "But I do not fear such things, though perhaps if I
took it, this would save me many a trouble. Still, there are others to
think of, and I will go." So, having knelt down to pray awhile by the
patient, and given the old nurse the basket of soup and food, Lysbeth
went.

Next morning she heard that the Vrouw Jansen was dead, the pest that
struck her being of the most fatal sort.

Lysbeth knew that she had run great risk, for there is no disease more
infectious than the plague. She determined, therefore, that so soon as
she reached home she would burn her dress and other articles of clothing
and purify herself with the fumes of herbs. Then she dismissed the
matter from her mind, which was already filled with another thought, a
dominant, soul-possessing thought.

Oh God, Montalvo had returned to Leyden! Out of the blackness of the
past, out of th