Tristan colored.
"How these two met I cannot fathom."
"Remember one thing, my son, their alliance portends evil to some one. What did they in the crypts?"
"The Lord Basil seems to have taken a fancy to exploring the cells," Tristan replied. "Those who have followed him report that he holds strange converse with the ghost of some mad monk whom he starved into eternity."
"And this converse—what is its subject?" Odo queried with awakening interest.
"A prophecy and a woman," Tristan replied. "Though those who heard them were so terror stricken at their infectious madness that they fled—not daring to tarry longer lest they would find themselves in the clutches of the fiend."
"A prophecy and a woman," Odo repeated pensively. "The Lord Alberic has confided much in me—his fears—his doubts! For even he knows not, how his mother came to her untimely end."
"The Lady Marozia?"
"The tale is known to you?"
"Rumors—flimsy—intangible—"