ld, yet living in the flesh. Sybil, I am thy
brother Roger, at least what remains of him; thou hast not
forgotten me."

"But why hast thou been silent so long? Thy brother in arms, the
great Earl of Leicester, himself said he saw thee fall fighting
gloriously against the fell Paynim."

"And he spake sooth, but he did not see me rise again. I was
carried off the field for interment by the good brethren of Saint
John, when, just as they were about to lower me with the dead
warriors into one common grave, they perceived that there was life
in me. They raised me, and restored the spirit which had all but
fled, and when at last it returned, reason did not return with it.
For a full year I was bereft of my senses. They kept me in the
hospital at Acre, but they knew nought, and could learn nought of
my kindred, until at length I recovered my reason. Then I told them
I was dead to the world, and besought them to keep me, but they
bade me wander, and stir up others to the rescue of the Holy Land
ere I took my rest. And then, too, there was my son--"

"Thy SON?"

"Yes. I see I had better unfold all to thee in detail, from the
beginning of my wanderings. After I had fled from my father's
wrath, I first went to sunny Provence, where I found friends in the
great family of the Montforts, and won the friendship of a man who
has since become famous, the Earl of Leicester. A distant kinswoman
of theirs, a cousin many times removed, effaced from my heart the
fickle damsel who had been the cause of my disgrace in England.
Poor Eveline! Never was there sweeter face or sunnier disposition!
Had she lived all had been well. I had not then gone forth,
abandoned to my own sinful self. But she died in giving birth to my
Hubert."

"Thy son, doth he yet live?"

"I left him in the care of Simon de Montfort, and went forward to
the rendezvous of the crusaders, the Isle of Malta, where, being
grievously insulted by a Frenchman--during a truce of God, which
had been proclaimed to the whole army--forgot all but my hot blood,
struck him, thereby provoked a combat, and slew him, for which I
was expelled the host, and forbidden to share in the holy war.

"So I sailed thence to Sicily--in deep dejection, repenting, all
too late, my ungovernable spirit.

"It was in the Isle of Sicily that an awful judgment befell me,
which has pursued me ever since, until it has blanched my locks
with gray, and hollowed out these wrinkles on my brow.

"I had t