Red-rod wished to see nothing which could prolong his stay in the physician's rooms. He bowed his refusal, and directed his men to proceed with the search. While they did so, Adrian turned into the inner room, and they heard him objurgating his careless pupil. Then he turned back again "Will it please you to come in here now?" he said. "I must apologise for the slightly disagreeable odour which still continues, though we have done what we could. It is only the medicine."

"It must be a very strong medicine," said Redrod, holding up his sleeve to his face as he appoached the door.

"It is a very costly one," returned Adrian. "A good twenty florins I gave for it, to my sorrow. Not reckoning the Venice glass."

The gallant officer pressed forward, followed by the two boldest of his satellites. The lamp was burning on the table-showing the skeleton in full view, and the slight figure in violet, with bowed head and averted face, kneeling on the ground.

Red-rod's companions beat a hasty retreat, but he himself, with carefully covered nose, began a rapid search, officiously turning over the bed, peeping behind and under every piece of furniture, and at last exploring the cabinet full of jars and bottles-only avoiding carefully the neighbourhood of that ghastly thing.

But he soon felt that he could not support the stench an instant longer without being poisoned, if poisoned he were not already.

Enough, master physician," he said through his sleeve, "I am convinced you are no harbourer of heretics. With regard to practices of magic," he added with a furtive glance at the skeleton, "it might be another matter. But we have no warrant to meddle with such things, wherefore I do myself the honour of wishing you good-night."

With very great satisfaction, Adrian bowed the ministers of justice out, and saw them safely down the stairs. Then he returned to his "patients," as he called them in his mind; and they certainly deserved the name by remaining quietly in the uncomfortable positions he had assigned them. He now released them, telling them the danger was over; then he threw open the little window that looked out on the court, and sprinkled copious libations of sweet waters all over the room.

It was time; for the old man was almost fainting, and the girl scarcely better. When at last the room was cleared of the horrible odour, he brought out bread and wine, of which he induced them both to partake.

As soon as they had sufficiently recovered, Marchemont expressed his gratitude in a few earnest words, full of feeling. But," he added, "we must not endanger you farther by remaining here any longer. Can you dd to your goodness by furnishing us with some disguise in which we may leave this place unnoticed?"

"Surely, my father, we need not ask it," the girl interposed, "we have all we need in our own room.'

Marchemont shook his head, and Adrian ex

plained. "Mademoiselle, the officers have locked your rooms, and taken the keys away with them, so you cannot return there. But I will provide what you want. My late pupil's dress for you, and a physician's cloak for Monsieur-Monsieur de Marchemont, I presume?"

"Gille de Marchemont, a humble preacher of the word of God, usually known here as Jean Gembours," said the preacher.

"Well, M. de Marchemont, you are aware that nothing more can be done to-night. No matter in what disguise, you must not venture forth, for the house will be watched. Rest here, with Mademoiselle your daughter, until the morning. I will remain in the other room, so that you may feel secure from all danger. Give me first a moment's grace."

He lit a second lamp, which he brought with him to the outer room, and speedily returned, dragging the pallet upon which Henry used to sleep. "You must both try to take rest," he said, as he re-arranged his own bed, disordered by the hands of Red-rod.

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But," ," said the young girl timidly, "where will you sleep yourself?"

"Oh, as for me, I shall resume my interrupted studies," said he, walking off with a great book under his arm, and closing the door behind him.

R

CHAPTER III.-ADRIAN'S DILEMMA.

ESUME his interrupted studies! That was not at all as easy a matter as Adrian thought. It was necessary first for him to resume his former self. As he stood there, lamp in hand, gazing at the door he had just closed, and thinking of the destinies of those within, any one who knew him would have marvelled at the change, even in his very appearance. His head was erect, and his usually stooping figure drawn up to its full height, while from his thoughtful face all sign of dreaminess or irresolution had passed away. The look that came instead was new to him, though at the same time very old, for it was the look of an ancestor who had died a soldier's death fighting against desperate odds in the wars of Charles the Bold. Thus the long past lives in us; reviving again at unforseen times and in unexpected ways, fitfully yet mightily.

He was thinking now of the red light that shone upon his book from that noon-day fire in the Grande Place. No! yonder brave old man should not be food for such a fire as that. Not if he could help it, and the girl! Who could bear to think of such a doom for her? Yet such things had been done, often and often. He had heard of them without heeding, almost as one hears sounds in sleep. But now, once for all, the horror burst upon his imagination, and it was intolerable. Yet, if he was to save them, he must be cool and wary, and consider well what he did. Disguises indeed he could furnish, but he knew next to nothing of the state of the city and of their chances of escape. Could he take counsel of the people of the house, who were evidently friendly, especially the woman? No, he decided, that would be dangerous. But the preacher himself would be

able to tell him what friends or confederates he had outside, he would talk with hin in the morning. In the meantime, there being nothing for him to do, and no bed for him to sleep upon, his best course seemed to be to sit down and read.

But between his eyes and the hitherto beloved pages of the learned Casalpinus there came, once and again, that lurid light from the martyr fire. There came also another sight, yet more persistently, a fair young face touched with the anguish of pathetic prayer. The bright golden hair, the blue eyes full of tears, the trembling lips from which the colour had fled, he saw all these again, and yet again.

He reproached himself for his idleness and want of concentration. It was worse, he told himself, than upon the night when Henry ran away, because then he had perhaps been somewhat to blame, whereas now he could not have done otherwise. Could not have done otherwise? So he said, though he knew that the laws of the country would condemn him, as an abettor of heretics, to the same doom as the heretics themselves, that is to say, to the doom of fire. Being however quite orthodox, so far as any one knew, he might probably receive so much mercy as to be hanged or beheaded instead of being burned alive. Still he must die. And what of that? "No worse for me than for them," thought the new, brave Adrian, looking as he thought it very like his soldier-ancestor. Then, remembering Archimedes and the unfinished problem and the Roman soldier, he bent once more over his book.

"What is her name? 'Rose,' a sweet-sounding name too. And she is French-Burgundian probably-like myself. That preacher is a brave man, undaunted in soul, though broken in body. I don't like that deadness in his arm. However, after to-morrow morning I shall see their faces again no more. What will become of her? I would fain know that, if I might. It seems to me that the eyes of my little sister Marie, as I remember them, had something like the same look in them sometimes-just a hint of it, though they were darker. I would gladly see Marie again,

have her with me, if I could. As soon as I am rich enough I will send for Marie, and look well to her. I will find her a good husband, and give her a marriage portion." These very unwonted reflections were certainly not suggested by Cæs alpinus. They were followed by fantasies still more confused and incoherent, for Adrian had slept but little on the previous night, so Nature at last claimed her due, and took it.

"HERE IS MY WARRANT."

He awoke from a deep sleep, to see beside him the face and form of which he had been dreaming. It seemed to him that his dream was going on still. But as he started and looked up at her, Rose de Marchemont drew back abashed and flushing.

"Pardon me," she faltered, "I knocked, and thought you bade me come in."

"You did right to come in," Adrian said. "How can I serve you, mademoiselle?"

"Oh, monsieur, for God's sake, come with me. Come to my father."

He looked up again. It was broad daylight; the sunshine filled the room. "What is the matter?" he asked quickly.

"His face looks strange, and he speaks with difficulty. He is very ill. He cannot move. I fear-oh, I fear he is dying. Monsieur, you are a physician. Will you come to him?"

Adrian rose without a word, and followed her into the next room. The spell was on him still; he was still the new Adrian, not the old.

The preacher lay on the bed that had been Adrian's, a coverlet drawn over him. His grey hair and worn, haggard face seemed to tell the tale of threescore-and-ten toilsome years; but in fact he was just the age of the great Emperor Charles when he laid down the heavy burden of sovereignty-fifty-five. Strenuous labour of mind and body, hardship and danger and suffering, had broken down the poor heretic preacher as early as the cares of state, the toils of ambition, and unlimited indulgence in sensual pleasures, had done the same work upon the mighty monarch whose edicts doomed him to the stake.

There was no beauty, save that of expression, in the aged weather-beaten face, now drawn somewhat to one side by his malady; but there was much good sense, much kindliness, and not a little dignity. Marchemont evidently was in full possession of his faculties, though it was not easy for him to speak.

"You are a physician, monsieur," he said slowly and with some indistinctness.

"Tell me,

I

I pray of you, what is the matter with me. cannot move. My side feels dead, and it is hard to speak."

Adrian removed the coverlet, and made a brief examination. It sufficed to convince him of the terrible truth. This was 66 a stroke." Marchenont's condition was perfectly hopeless; yet he might live for months, even for years. He would never walk again.

He turned first to Rose, who was bending over her father, all her anxious heart shining in her eyes. "He is not dying," he said. "Nor in immediate danger."

The soft lips parted to breathe a fervent "Thank God!" Then Marchemont said gently, "Rose, ma mie." She turned on him a look of love and confidence fair to see.

"Thou hearest what the physican says. Wherefore be comforted, and give us leave, I pray thee, for a little space."

"Mademoiselle may rest safely in the other room," said Adrian, leading her thither and closing the door behind her.

He came back to the bedside. "It is no doubt the agitation of last night which has caused this calamity," he said. "You had a warning already in the numbness of your arm.”

"It is the will of God," Gille de Marchemont answered calmly. After a pause he added, “I have been ill for hours, which in such a case means years; unconscious I think at first, then I recovered to find myself helpless."

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Why, then, did you not send for me before?" "Because I would not wake the child. knows when she will sleep so calmly again.

God And

Adrian stood gazing at him blankly, looking far more like his ordinary self than he had done yet. Presently Marchemont resumed, calmly, though he always spoke with difficulty, and with frequent pauses: "There is only one thing to do, Monsieur le Docteur, you must give me up. There is no other way."

Adrian started. Some eager words rose to his lips, but he forced them back and kept silence, allowing the preacher to continue.

"I can neither leave this place a free man, nor remain in it. God has spoken by His Providence. For three-and-thirty years He has honoured me to work for Him; now, in my old age, He honours me to die for Him."

"To die, and by fire?" cried Adrian. you mean that?"

"Do

"What matters the road if the goal be won? I have looked long for this. In Geneva we were trained for martyrdom. It was the school of martyrs."

"But your child?"

"I know how to provide for her safety, with the kind help you will not refuse. There is in this city a good woman, poor in this world's wealth but rich in faith, who will take my Rose as a sacred charge, and send her back, when it can be done, to her kindred in Sedan. I doubt not, monsieur, you will summon this friend for me, and let me give Rose into her care, before we do the rest."

"You think then there is no other way-truly and absolutely no other way?" Adrian asked slowly.

"No other way. Save indeed a way which is not good which my conscience gives me no freedom to accept."

"Name it," said Adrian. scrupulous."

"Mine may not be so

"That you, with your own hand, should slay me here where I lie-my recovery being plainly hopeless. Or, better-you are a physician, and have powerful drugs at your command. It were

easy nay, nay, forgive me, I pray you, for the suggestion. It was the weakness of the flesh, the shrinking of the old Adam from the anguish-from the cross. It is over now-forget it-Do with a stout heart, and as soon as you can, what we both know must be done. Place Rose in safety, acquaint the authorities with the fact of my presence here, and leave the rest with God."

"I have heard you to the end," said Adrian firmly, with the new look on his face again. "And now, Master Preacher, hear me. Were I to do as you propose, the very children in the streets would cry shame upon me, and my own soul would scorn me for ever. Know, therefore, that I will not give you up, not if my own life is the forfeit."

"There speaks your heart, and a generous heart

'I consider my honour and my duty. Enough said, Master Preacher, my resolve is final." He walked into the next room, and accosted Rose, who was seated at the table, with the folio of Casalpinus open before her. She might have been reading it, for she knew Latin, but it is highly improbable.

"Will you go to your father for a little while?" he said gently. "And I pray of you to tell him, you are both safe here."

He shut the door behind her, and sat down to "consider the circumstances," as Marchemont asked him to do. He knew already that he was placing himself in a position at once horribly embarrassing and frightfully dangerous. Every word the preacher said was quite true. To conceal his guests seemed impossible. There was only one thing more impossible-to betray them.

Deeper and deeper grew his perplexity, as the strong spell that had been over him relaxed, and he began to change gradually into his ordinary self. His generous resolution had come from what was deeper in him than all changes-than all conscious thought--and it remained unshaken. But the energy, the promptness, the decision, which a sudden crisis had called forth from the recesses of his nature were fading from him, and leaving the dreamy scholar face to face with a task too hard for him. How could he combat, in his sober senses, the hostile hosts he had called up around him in that inspired delirium when his strength was as the strength of ten?

The more he pondered the more insurmountable difficulties rose up before his mind. That the young lady should remain with her father seemed a thing impossible, yet even if she could be got safely away, how could her father do without her? Adrian was utterly incapable of rendering him the services his situation required. How was he to conceal his presence there? how was he to feed him "I cannot do it," he said at last, as the result of his musings. But the next moment he said again, "I must."

He sat contemplating the position until his body grew almost as benumbed with cold as his mind was dazed with perplexity. Awaking to the necessity of food and fire for himself, he thought also of his guests. Food he could provide, fire unfortunately was impossible. The servant of the house, who now usually waited upon him, must on no account be admitted into the inner room. Even while he was thinking thus, he heard her well-known knock at the door.

He opened it; and sat dreamily watching the old woman as she went about her usual avocations. At last she began to talk to him in Flemish. She was grumbling loudly over the visit of Red-rod and his satellites the night before, and wondering what could have become of Gembours, or Marchemont-or whatever his name might be.

"And the girl?-what harm could a girl do any one? They are well away, God help them! Though, as for that, there will soon be nobody left in the house; the merchant's clerk, who lodges in the rooms below, says his wife was so frightened

by the hurly-burly, that she will not stop in the place another day-no, not if she has to sell the gold pins out of her cap to pay up the rent; one couldn't be sure of one's life in a house where heretics are harboured. Though for my part, I don't think it is the heretics, but the people that come to take them that make the trouble."

Adrian interrupted her torrent of words. The first helpful thought had come to him with them. Might it be possible for him, by taking the rooms below in addition to his own, to provide for the concealment of his guests? How he was to do it he did not see yet, but this at least was the beginning of a hope. He said, "So many doctors have left the town, that my patients are greatly increased in number. I want another room or two in which to receive them. Perhaps I could have those that will be empty now?"

The servant thought he could; and was confirmed in her opinion by the gift of a silver florin, not the first she had had from Adrian, who, like most kind-hearted unpractical people, was very free with his money. Then he said diplomatically, "How cold it is, Mevrouw. I think I could relish a good hot dinner to-day. Fish, perhaps, and a savoury pudding, and- -" with a desperate effort to guess the probable tastes of a lady, "a capon stewed with prunes." It was yet early, but in those days people usually dined at ten in the fore

noon.

"You shall have it, Mynheer, and glad I am to hear you ask for anything so sensible and Christian-like. Indeed, you want a good dinner for once, with your fasts, and your long vigils at night over your books."

But it was well perhaps that Adrian did hear some portion of what she said to herself as she went downstairs. "Christian like, indeed! Not much of a Christian, I am afraid, and more's the pity, since he has a good heart. It passes me to think why our lords the bishops should be so keen after burning poor folk for singing a hymn or the like, and have never a word to say to a learned gentleman who is doing-heaven knows what magic and sorcery-shut up in that room of his. Holy Mary! Shall I ever forget the day I peeped in and saw a dead man standing up in nothing at all but his bones? The saints protect us! 'Tis a strange world we live in, and an ill one, between heretics and sorcerers."

Meanwhile, through her words, hope had dawned upon Adrian; though it was but a faint feeble ray, dimly showing him a path that might lead him through his difficulties. It might be possible to conceal his guests, though at the expense of immense discomfort to himself, if he hired the two other rooms, ostensibly for his own purposes. But he would need a staid and suitable woman, who would be a companion to the young lady, and assist her in her cares for her father. Perhaps the preacher might know of such amongst his flock, for she must be a heretic herself, and one thoroughly trusted amongst them, though she would have to pass as his own servant. would ask. He returned to Marchemont, told him his thoughts, so far as they had gone yet, and added, "Can you name to me any good woman

He

who, out of zeal for your religion, and love for you and Mademoiselle, would take this office upon her?"

But Marchemont continued to protest against his plan, and to point out the awful danger he was incurring. In vain. Knowing scarcely anything else, nor seeing his way clearly a hand's-breadth before him, Adrian yet knew one thing, that he would not betray his new friends. "My resolve is made," he said. "No man, if I can help it, shall cross yonder threshold to do you harm. The question is not what to do, but how to do it."

He prevailed at last. Marchemont gave him the name and address of the woman to whose care, in the event of his own apprehension, he had intended to confide his daughter. Adrian accordingly went to the Rue au Sucre in search of one Elizabeth Hoofden. He no sooner entered into conversation with her, and explained the circumstances, than he felt the immense relief of being in the hands of a thoroughly capable woman. "Save M. de Marchemont and Ma'amselle Rose? Surely yes, with the help of God. Not the first for me, by many a time either. Let us think."

After an interval of thought, she resumed, "You are growing rich, Mynheer, you want more service, and can pay for it. I know Peregrine and Catherine Blois right well. He cannot be trusted, but she can. He need know no more— and what she knows she will not tell. Does any one but yourself ever enter the room where you study?"

Rarely, and never without distinct permission." "M. de Marchemont is there now, you say? It is the safest place for him, and besides, I suppose we could not move him. Could you move your books, Mynheer, and study elsewhere?"

66

Adrian shook his head with a most decided negative. 'Impossible! It is not books alone, but instruments and other things, which a scholar and physician needs for use or experiment."

"Well, then, Mynheer, I fear you will have to study with M. de Marchemont lying there on his bed. He will not disturb you."

"Not disturb me!" Adrian repeated, with anguish in his voice. It seemed to him just then that the stake itself would scarcely be worse than this murder of his privacy. No matter, he had offered the sacrifice, and he would not shrink from its uttermost bitterness. Elizabeth saw that he was troubled, though the cause of his trouble was quite beyond her comprehension. She went on encouragingly, "It will be very easy. Ma'amselle Rose must take a disguise, and come as my daughter, or my niece, to help me, and bear me company, since Mynheer has strange things about

him, which might frighten an ignorant woman, if she were left alone. Ma'amselle and I will do your work and attend to M. de Marchemont when you are out, and during the night, you sleeping in another room."

"I suppose it must be," said Adrian gloomily. To some natures short, sharp danger is far less hard to bear than continual discomfort, and the shunting of their daily life from off all its accustomed grooves.

"Send me a message, Mynheer, as soon as you have settled with your landlord," said Elizabeth, "I will manage all the rest. God bless you, Mynheer."

Adrian, on his way home, was stopped by a little crowd which had gathered in the street. Some were shouting, but he could not make out the words. At last however he heard distinctly, "Down with the bishops! Down with the Inquisition!" He saw amongst the crowd his young fellow-lodger, the merchant's clerk, who was shouting as loud as any one else. Making his way up to him, he laid his hand on his shoulder, and asked, "Prithee, friend, what is it all about?"

"Look yonder!" said the young man, pointing to a large placard affixed to the wall. "There's a call to you, and to all honest men to stop such things as happened in our house last night. The like of it in smaller letters, has been 'snowing' in the streets, from what hands no man knoweth. Here is one of them. It is time certainly some one should lift a hand to save us from these harryings, and searchings, and burnings. Even good Catholics like us, who never thought of heresy, cannot be let alone. My word, Mynheer, but those gentlemen turned up every corner in our room, even the cupboards and the bedstraw. My wife, whose babe is but two weeks old, was frightened almost out of her wits. I am seeking another lodging for her now, and must not tarry. But I trust, mynheer doctor, you were molested?"

not

"I had my share of the trouble, like the rest. But the world knows that men of my profession do not often meddle with heresy. Perhaps, if once they began, it might not be easy to stop them."

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But," said the clerk, "I wonder what became of the preacher and his daughter. I hope, for my part, that they got away somehow. Good day, mynheer doctor."

"I am sure I wonder what will become of them, and of me," thought Adrian as he turned away. "But, come life or death-or what is worse even -come death to my studies and my dreams, I will save alive this Gille de Marchemont and his daughter, Mademoiselle Rose."