z, he soon turned into the central corridor,
which is open to the sky above, and was spectrally alight now with
flag-stones and walls gleaming beneath the silvery sheen of the moon,
and throwing back the fantastic elongated shadows of the two men as they
walked.

On the left, heavily barred windows gave on the corridor, as did here
and there the massive oaken doors, with their gigantic hinges and bolts,
on the steps of which squatted groups of soldiers wrapped in their
cloaks, with wild, suspicious eyes beneath their capotes, peering at the
midnight visitor as he passed.

There was no thought of silence here. The very walls seemed alive with
sounds, groans and tears, loud wails and murmured prayers; they exuded
from the stones and trembled on the frost-laden air.

Occasionally at one of the windows a pair of white hands would appear,
grasping the heavy iron bar, trying to shake it in its socket, and
mayhap, above the hands, the dim vision of a haggard face, a man's or a
woman's, trying to get a glimpse of the outside world, a final look at
the sky, before the last journey to the place of death to-morrow. Then
one of the soldiers, with a loud, angry oath, would struggle to his
feet, and with the butt-end of his gun strike at the thin, wan fingers
till their hold on the iron bar relaxed, and the pallid face beyond
would sink back into the darkness with a desperate cry of pain.

A quick, impatient sigh escaped de Batz' lips. He had skirted the wide
courtyard in the wake of his guide, and from where he was he could see
the great central tower, with its tiny windows lighted from within, the
grim walls behind which the descendant of the world's conquerors, the
bearer of the proudest name in Europe, and wearer of its most ancient
crown, had spent the last days of his brilliant life in abject shame,
sorrow, and degradation. The memory had swiftly surged up before him of
that night when he all but rescued King Louis and his family from this
same miserable prison: the guard had been bribed, the keeper corrupted,
everything had been prepared, save the reckoning with the one
irresponsible factor--chance!

He had failed then and had tried again, and again had failed; a fortune
had been his reward if he had succeeded. He had failed, but even now,
when his footsteps echoed along the flagged courtyard, over which
an unfortunate King and Queen had walked on their way to their last
ignominious Calvary, he hugged himself with the sat