nt down as though he were cowering from an expected blow.
Now he lifted himself up, and held out his hand.

"Bruno de Malpas, thou art welcome, if God hath sent thee."

"God sends all events," answered the priest, accepting the offered hand.

"Ay, I am trying to learn that," replied Abraham, in a voice of great
pain. "For at times He sends that which breaks the heart."

"That He may heal it, my father."

The title, from Bruno's lips, surprised and puzzled Belasez.

"It may be so," said Abraham in a rather hopeless tone. "`It is Adonai;
let Him do what seemeth Him good.' So thou hast made friends with--my
Belasez."

"I did not know she was thine when I made friends with her," said Bruno,
with that quiet smile of his which had always seemed to Belasez at once
so sweet and so sad.

"`Did not know'? No, I suppose not. Ah, yes, yes! `Did not know'!"

"Does this child know my history?" was Bruno's next question.

"She knows," said Abraham in a troubled voice, "nearly as much as thou
knowest."

"Then she knows all?"

"Nay, she knows nothing."

"You speak in riddles, my father."

"My son, I am about to do that which will break my heart. Nay,--God is
about to do it. Let me put it thus, or I shall not know how to bear
it."

"I have no wish nor intention to trouble you, my father," said Bruno
hastily. "If I might, now and then, see this child,--to tell truth, it
would be a great pleasure and solace to me: for I have learned to love
her,--just the years of my Beatrice, just what Beatrice might have grown
to be. Yet--if I speak I must speak honestly--give me leave to see
Belasez, only on the understanding that I may speak to her of Christ.
She is dear as any thing in this dreary world, but He is dearer than the
world and all that is in it. If I may not do this, let me say farewell,
and see her no more."

"Thou hast spoken to her--of the Nazarene?" asked Abraham in a low tone.

"I have," was Bruno's frank reply.

"Thou hast taught her the Christian faith?"

"So far as I could do it."

Belasez stood trembling. Yet Abraham did not seem angry.

"Thou hast baptised her, perhaps?"

"No. That I have not."

"Not?--why not?"

"She was fit for it in my eyes; and--may I say it, Belasez?--she was
willing. But my hands were not clean enough. I felt that I could not
repress a sensation of triumphing over Licorice, if I baptised her
daughter. May the Lord forgive me if I erred, but I did not dare to d