Sebastian paused on the steep, dark stairs and listened.

Castle Martzburg was utterly silent; he knew that there were one or two servants only within the walls, and that they slept at a distance; he knew that his cautious entry by the donjon door had made no sound, yet on every other step or so he stood still and listened.

He had procured a light; it fluttered in danger of extinction in the draughty stairway, and he had to shield it with his hand.

Once, when he stopped, he took from his belt the keys that had gained him admission and slipped them into the bosom of his doublet; hanging at his waist, they made a little jingling sound as he moved.

When he gained the great hall he opened the door as softly and slowly as if he did not know emptiness alone awaited him the other side.

He entered, and his little light only served to show the expanses of gloom.

It was very cold; he could hear the rain falling in a thin stream from the lips of the gargoyles without; he remembered that same sound on the night the two students took shelter; the night when the deed he was about to do had by a devil, in a whisper, been first put into his head.

He crossed to the hearth and set the lamp in the niche by the chimney-piece; he wished there was a fire — certainly it was cold.

The dim rays of the lamp showed the ashes on the hearth, the cushions in the window-seat, and something that, even in that dullness, shone with fiery hue.

Sebastian looked at it in a half horror: it was Sybilla’s red lily, finished and glowing from a samite cushion; by the side of it slept Jacobea’s little grey cat.

The steward gazing in curiously intent fashion recalled the fact that he had never conversed with his wife and never liked her; he could not tell of one sharp word between them, yet had she said she hated him he would have felt no surprise; he wondered, in case he had ever loved her, would he have been here to-night on this errand.

Lord of Martzburg! — lord of as fine a domain as any in the empire, with a chance of the imperial crown itself — nay, had he loved his wife it would have made no difference; what sorry fool even would let a woman interfere with a great destiny — Lord of Martzburg.

With little reflection on the inevitable for his wife, he fell to considering Jacobea; until to-night she had been a cipher to him — that she favoured him a mere voucher for his crime; for the procuring of this or that for him — a fact to be accepted and used; but that she should pray about him — speak as she had — that was another matter, and for the first time in his cold life he was both moved and ashamed. His thin, dark face flushed; he looked askance at the red lily and took the light from its niche.

The shadows seemed to gather and throng out of the silence, bearing down on him and urging him forward; he found the little door by the fireplace open, and ascended the steep stone stairs to his wife’s room.

Here there was not even the drip of the rain or the wail of the wind to disturb the stillness; he had taken off his boots, and his silk-clad feet made no sound, but he could not hush the catch of his breath and the steady thump of his heart.

When he reached her room he paused again, and again listened.

Nothing — how could there be? Had he not come so softly even the little cat had slept on undisturbed?

He opened the door and stepped in.

It was a small, low chamber; the windows were unshrouded, and fitful moonlight played upon the floor; Sebastian looked at once towards the bed, that stood to his left; it was hung with dark arras, now drawn back from the pillows.

Sybilla was asleep; her thick, heavy hair lay outspread under her cheek; her flesh and the bedclothes were turned to one dazzling whiteness by the moon.

Worked into the coverlet, that had slipped half to the polished floor, were great wreaths of purple roses, showing dim yet gorgeous.

Her shoes stood on the bed steps; her clothes were flung over a chair; near by a crucifix hung against the wall, with her breviary on a shelf beneath.

The passing storm clouds cast luminous shadows across the chamber; but they were becoming fainter, the tempest was dying away. Sebastian put the lamp on a low coffer inside the door and advanced to the bed.

A large dusky mirror hung beside the window, and in it he could see his wife again, reflected dimly in her ivory whiteness with the dark lines of her hair and brows.

He came to the bedside so that his shadow was flung across her sleeping face.

“Sybilla,” he said.

Her regular breathing did not change.

“Sybilla.”

A swift cloud obscured the moon; the sickly rays of the lamp struggled with darkness. “Sybilla.”

Now she stirred; he heard her fetch a sigh as one who wakens reluctantly from soft dreams. “Do you not hear me speak, Sybilla?”

From the bewildering glooms of the bed he heard her silk bed-clothes rustle and slip; the moon came forth again and revealed her sitting up, wide awake now and staring at him.

“So you have come home, Sebastian?” she said. “Why did you rouse me?”

He looked at her in silence; she shook back her hair from her eyes.

“What is it?” she asked softly.

“The Emperor died,” said Sebastian.

“I know — what is that to me? Bring the light, Sebastian; I cannot see your face.”

“There is no need; the Emperor had not time to pray, I would not deal so with you, therefore I woke you.”

“Sebastian!”

“By my mistress’s commands you must die tonight, and by my desire; I shall be Lord of Martzburg, and there is no other way —”

She moved her head, and, peering forward, tried to see his face.

“Make your peace with Heaven,” he said hoarsely; “for tomorrow I must go to her a free man.”

She put her hand to her long throat.

“I wondered if you would ever say this to me — I did not think so, for it did not enter my mind that she could give commands.”

“Then you knew?”

Sybilla smiled.

“Before ever you did, Sebastian, and I have so thought of it, in these long days when I have been alone, it seemed that I must sew it even into my embroideries —‘Jacobea loves Sebastian.’” He gripped the bed-post.

“It is the strangest thing,” said his wife, “that she should love you — you — and send you here to-night; she was a gracious maiden.”

“I am not here to talk of that,” answered Sebastian; “nor have we long — the dawn is not far off.”

Sybilla rose, setting her long feet on the bed step.

“So I must die,” she said —“must die. Certes! I have not lived so ill that I should fear to die, nor so pleasantly that I should yearn to live; it will be a poor thing in you to kill me, but no shame to me to be slain, my lord.”

As she stood now against the shadowed curtains her hair caught the lamplight and flashed into red gold about her colourless face; Sebastian looked at her with hatred and some terror, but she smiled strangely at him.

“You never knew me, Sebastian, but I am very well acquainted with you, and I do scorn you so utterly that I am sorry for the chatelaine.”

“She and I will manage that,” answered Sebastian fiercely; “and if you seek to divert or delay me by this talk it is useless, for I am resolved, nor will I be moved.”

“I do not seek to move you, nor do I ask you for my life. I have ever been dutiful, have I not?” “Do not smile at me!” he cried. “You should hate me.”

She shook her head.

“Certes! I hate you not.”

She moved from the bed, in the long linen garment that she wore, slim and childish to see. She took a wrap of gold-coloured silk from a chair and put it about her. The man gazed at her the while with sullen eyes.

She glanced at the crucifix.

“I have nothing to say; God knows it all. I am ready.”

“I do not want your soul,” he cried.

Sybilla smiled.

“I made confession yesterday. How cold it is for this time of the year! — I do not shiver for fear, my lord.”

She put on her shoes, and as she stooped her brilliant hair fell and touched the patch of fading moonshine.

“Make haste,” breathed Sebastian.

His wife raised her face.

“How long have we been wed?” she asked.

“Let that be.”

He paled and bit his lip.

“Three years — nay, not three years. When I am dead give my embroideries to Jacobea, they are in these coffers; I have finished the red lily — I was sewing it when the two scholars came, that night she first knew — and you first knew — but I had known a long while.”

Sebastian caught up the lamp.

“Be silent or speak to God,” he said.

She came gently across the floor, holding the yellow silk at her breast.

“What are you going to do with me?” she whispered. “Strangle me? — nay, they would see that —— afterwards.”

Sebastian went to a little door that opened beside the bed and pulled aside the arras. “That leads to the battlements,” she said.

He pointed to the dark steps.

“Go up, Sybilla.”

He held the lamp above his haggard face, and the light of it fell over the narrow winding stone steps; she looked at them and ascended. Sebastian followed, closing the door after him. In a few moments they were out on the donjon roof.

The vast stretch of sky was clear now and paling for the dawn; faint pale clouds clustered round the dying moon, and the scattered stars pulsed wearily.

Below them lay the dark masses of the other portions of the castle, and beside them rose the straining pole and wind-tattered banner of Jacobea of Martzburg.

Sybilla leant against the battlements, her hair fluttering over her face.

“How cold it is!” she said in a trembling voice. “Make haste, my lord.”

He was shuddering, too, in the keen, insistent wind.

“Will you not pray?” he asked again.

“No,” she answered, and looked at him vacantly. “If I shriek would any one hear me? — Will it be more horrible than I thought? Make haste — make haste — or I shall be afraid.”

She crouched against the stone, shivering violently. Sebastian put the lamp upon the ground. “Take care it does not go out,” she said, and laughed. “You would not like to find your way back in the dark — the little cat will be sorry for me.”

She broke off to watch what he was doing.

A portion of the tower projected; here the wall was of a man’s height, and pierced with arblast holes; through there Sybilla had often looked and seen the country below framed in the stone like a picture in a letter of an hor?e, so small it seemed, and yet clear and brightly coloured.

Beneath the wall was a paving-stone, raised at will by an iron ring; when lifted it revealed a sheer open drop the entire height of the donjon, through which stones and fire could be hurled in time of siege upon the assailants in the courtyard below; but Jacobea had always shuddered at it, nor had there been occasion to open it for many years.

Sybilla saw her husband strain at the ring and bend over the hole, and stepped forward. “Must it............