"As God lives, my reverend Father, you are right! I am but a child!" cried the Duke of Anjou, beaming with infernal joy after listening to the confidential remarks whispered to him by the monk. He then again addressed his favorites: "Take the heretic girl to the reverend Father's cell. But, good Father, keep a watchful eye upon her. Her life is now as precious to you as to me."
Cornelia was led away upon the steps of the fratricidal monk.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE BILL IS PAID.
Fra Hervé lived in the house of the Reservoir of the Font suburb in a sort of cellar that was vaulted, somber and damp as a cave, and which one time served as the direct communication to the aqueduct by means of a stone staircase, closed from above by a trap door. The monk's gloomy lodging was reached through a corridor that opened into one of the rooms situated on the ground floor, and, since the siege, transformed into a hall reserved for the officers of the Duke of Anjou.
The interior of Fra Hervé's retreat revealed the austerity of the man's cenobitic habits. A wooden box, filled with ashes and resembling a coffin, served him for bed. A stool stood before a rough hewn table on which were an hour-glass, a breviary, a skull and an iron lamp. The latter cast a pale light over the cave, in a corner of which a heavy trap door masked the now disused stone staircase, the entrance to which had been walled from within by the royalists, in order to prevent a surprise from that quarter, seeing the water was turned off.
Taken to the gloomy cell, Cornelia found herself alone with the monk. She was aware there was no hope of escape or of mercy for her. The cell had no issue other than the corridor that connected with the hall of the Prince's officers of the guard, which was constantly crowded with the Prince's retinue. Fra Hervé's face was emaciated. His forehead, over which a few locks of grey hair tumbled in disorder, was bony and lustrous as the skull upon his table. Except for the somber luster of his hollow eyes, one would at first sight take the scarred and fleshless head of the monk for that of a corpse. He was seated on the stool. Cornelia, standing before him, shuddered with horror. She found herself alone with the monster who, at the battle of Roche-la-Belle, cut the throat of Odelin, the father of Antonicq, her betrothed. Fra Hervé remained meditative for a moment, and then addressed the young girl in a hollow voice:
"You are aware of the fate that Monseigneur the Duke of Anjou reserved for you in punishment for your attempted murder? You were to be thrown to the soldiers of the garrison—"
"I am in your power—what do you want of me?" interrupted Cornelia.
"The salvation of your soul."
"My soul belongs to God. I have lived and I shall die in my faith, and in execration for the Catholic church."