life! And pain and all might have been spared him,--poor fellow!
poor fellow!" Manetho lacked but little of shedding true tears over
the evidence of his dearest foe's useless dread and anguish. Did he
wish Balder to bring undulled nerves to his own torture-chamber?

His lament over, Manetho turned to Nurse for such information
regarding the guest's arrival and behavior as she might have to
communicate. Of his own affair with Balder he made no mention. The
conversation was carried on by signs, according to a code long since
grown up between the two. When the tale was told, Nurse was despatched
to make ready Helen's room for the new-comer, and thither did the two
laboriously bear him, and laid him, still sleeping, on his mother's
bed.

XXVI.

MUSIC AND MADNESS.

Before leaving Balder to his repose, Manetho paused to regain his
breath, and to throw a glance round the room. It was a place he seldom
visited. He had seen Helen's dead body lie on that bed, and the sight
had bred in him an animosity against the chamber and everything it
contained. After Doctor Glyphic's death he had gratified this feeling
in a characteristic manner. Possessing a genius for drawing second
only to that for music, he had exercised it on the walls of the room,
originally modelled and tinted to represent a robin's egg. He mixed
his colors with the bitter distillations of his heart, and created the
beautiful but ill-omened vision which long afterwards so disquieted
Balder.--

From the chamber he now repaired to the kitchen, which was in some
respects the most attractive place in the house. The smoky ceiling;
the cavernous cupboards opening into the walls; the stanch dressers,
polished by use and mottled with many an ancient stain; the great
black range, which would have cooked a meal for a troop of
men-at-arms,--all spoke of homely comfort. Nurse had Manetho's meal
ready for him, and, having set it out on the table, she retired to her
position in the chimney-corner. The Egyptian's spare body was
ordinarily nourished with little more than goes to the support of an
Arab, and Nurse's monotonous life must have been unfavorable to large
appetite. As for Gnulemah,--although young women are said to thrive
and grow beautiful on a diet of morning dew, noonday sunshine, and
evening mist,--it seems quite likely that she ate no less than the
health and activity of a Diana might naturally require.

Manetho made a gleeful repast, and Nurse looked o