e will never fail you at
need--night and day, rough and smooth, fair and foul, warm stables and
the winter sky, are the same to Klepper; had I cleared the gates of
Peronne, and got so far as where I left him, I had not been in this
case.--Will you be kind to Klepper?"

"I swear to you that I will," answered Quentin, affected by what seemed
a trait of tenderness in a character so hardened.

"Then fare thee well!" said the criminal. "Yet stay--stay--I would not
willingly die in discourtesy, forgetting a lady's commission.--This
billet is from the very gracious and extremely silly Lady of the Wild
Boar of Ardennes, to her black eyed niece--I see by your look I have
chosen a willing messenger.--And one word more--I forgot to say, that in
the stuffing of my saddle you will find a rich purse of gold pieces,
for the sake of which I put my life on the venture which has cost me
so dear. Take them, and replace a hundred fold the guilders you have
bestowed on these bloody slaves--I make you mine heir."

"I will bestow them in good works and masses for the benefit of thy
soul," said Quentin.

"Name not that word again," said Hayraddin, his countenance assuming a
dreadful expression; "there is--there can be, there shall be--no such
thing!--it is a dream of priestcraft."

"Unhappy, most unhappy being! Think better! let me speed for a
priest--these men will delay yet a little longer. I will bribe them to
it," said Quentin. "What canst thou expect, dying in such opinions, and
impenitent?"

"To be resolved into the elements," said the hardened atheist, pressing
his fettered arms against his bosom; "my hope, trust, and expectation is
that the mysterious frame of humanity shall melt into the general mass
of nature, to be recompounded in the other forms with which she daily
supplies those which daily disappear, and return under different
forms--the watery particles to streams and showers, the earthy parts to
enrich their mother earth, the airy portions to wanton in the breeze,
and those of fire to supply the blaze of Aldebaran and his brethren.--In
this faith have I lived, and I will die in it!--Hence! begone!--disturb
me no farther!--I have spoken the last word that mortal ears shall
listen to."

Deeply impressed with the horrors of his condition, Quentin Durward yet
saw that it was vain to hope to awaken him to a sense of his fearful
state. He bade him, therefore, farewell, to which the criminal only
replied by a short and sulle