as looking at me with unseeing eyes, but I knew and felt that she
would follow me now to the end of the world. I had no more any doubts
as to the issue of our enterprise; it was open to no unsuccess with a
figure so steadfast engaged in it; it was impossible that blind fate
should be insensible to her charm, impossible that any man could strike
at or thwart her.

Monks began to sing; a great brass instrument grunted lamentably; in the
body of the building there was silence. The bishop and his supporters
moved about, as if aimlessly, in front of the altar; the chains of the
gold censors clicked ceaselessly. Seraphina's head had sunk forward out
of my sight. All the heads of the cathedral bowed down, and suddenly,
from round the side of the stall, a hand touched mine, and a voice said,
"It is time." Very softly, as if it were part of the rite, I was drawn
round the stall through a door in the side of the screen. As we went
out, in his turnings, the old bishop gave us the benediction. Then the
door closed on the glory of his robes, and in a minute, in the darkness
we were rustling down a circular narrow staircase into the dimness of
a crypt, lit by the little blue flame of an oil lamp. From above came
sounds like thunder, immense, vibrating; we were immediately under the
choir. Through the cracks round a large stone showed a parallelogram of
light.

In the dimness I had a glimpse of the face of my conductor--a thin,
wonderfully hollow-cheeked lay brother. He began, with great gentleness,
to assist me out of my black robes, and then he said:

"The senorita will be here very soon with the Senor Tomas," and then
added, with an infinitely sad and tender, dim smile:

"Will not the Senor Caballero, if it is not repugnant, say a prayer for
the repose of..." He pointed gently upwards to the great flagstone above
which was the coffin of Don Balthasar and Carlos. The priest himself was
one of those very holy, very touching---perhaps, very stupid--men that
one finds in such places. With his dim, wistful face he is very present
in my memory. He added: "And that the good God of us all may keep it
in the Senor Caballero's heart to care well for the soul of the dear
senorita."

"I am a very old man," he whispered, after a pause. He was indeed an
old man, quite worn out, quite without hope on earth. "I have loved the
senorita since she was a child. The Senor Caballero takes her from us. I
would have him pray--to be made worthy."

W