great chair with her eyes closed, breathing
slowly and gently through her parted lips. Messire Gilles stood before
her with his hands joined palm to palm and his white fingertips almost
touching the girl's brow.

"Work my will and tell me what you see!"

Her hands were clasped under a light silken apron which she wore
descending from her neck and caught in a loose loop behind her gown.
The fingers were firmly netted one over the other and clutched between
them was a golden crucifix.

The girl was praying, as one prays who dares not speak.

"O God, who didst hang on this cross--keep now my soul. Condemn it
afterwards, but help me to keep it this night. Deliver me--oh, deliver
from the power of this man. Help me to lie. By Thy Son's blood, help
me to lie well this night."

"Where are the three men from the land of the Scots? Tell me what you
see. Tell me all," the marshal commanded, still standing before her in
the same posture.

Then the voice of the Lady Sybilla began to speak, low and even, and
with that strange halt at the end of the sentences. The Lord of Retz
nodded, well pleased when he heard the sound. It was the voice of the
seeress. Oftentimes he had heard it before, and it had never deceived
him.

"I see a boat on a stormy sea," she said; "there are three men in it.
One is great of stature and very strong. The others are young men.
They are trying to furl the sail. A gust strikes them. The boat heels
and goes over. I see them struggling in the pit of waters. There are
cliffs white and crumbling above them. They are calling for help as
they cling to the boat. Now there is but one of them left. I see him
trying to climb up the slippery rocks. He falls back each time. He is
weary with much buffeting. The waves break about him and suck him
under. Now I do not see the men any more, but I can hear the broken
mast of the boat knocking hollow and dull against the rocks. Some few
shreds of the sail are wrapped about it. But the three men are gone."

She ceased suddenly. Her lips stopped their curiously detached
utterance.

But under her breath and deep in her soul Sybilla de Thouars was still
praying as before. And this which follows was her prayer:

"O God, his devil is surely departed from him. I thank thee, God of
truth, for helping me to lie."

"It is well," said Gilles de Retz, standing erect with
a satisfied air. "All is well. The three Scots who sought my life are
gone to their destruction. Now, S