Imperceptibly Blondel had raised himself in his chair. The gleam of hope, once lighted in his eyes, was growing bright. "How?" he asked. "How shall we find her? If it be the philtre only that she has taken—as you say?"

"If it be the philtre? The mother, you mean?"

"Yes."

"Mad! Mad!" Basterga repeated with decision, "and beside herself. As you had been," he continued grimly, "had you by any chance taken the aqua Medeæ."

"That you kept in the steel box?"

"Ay."

"You are sure it was not the remedium?" Blondel leaned forward. If only he could believe it, if only it were the truth, how great the difference! No wonder that the muscles of his lean throat swelled, and his hands closed convulsively on the arms of his great chair, as he strove to read the other's mind.

He had as soon read a printed page without light. The scholar saw that it needed but a little to convince him, and took his line with confidence; nor without some pride in the wits that had saved him. "The remedium?" he repeated with impatient wonder. "Do you know that the remedium is unique? That it is a man's life? That in the world's history it scarce appears once in five hundred years? That all the wealth of kings cannot produce it, nor the Spanish Indies furnish it? Do you remember these things, Messer Blondel, and do you ask if I keep it like a common philtre in a box in my lodgings?" He snorted in contempt, and going disdainfully to the hearth spat in the fire as if he could not brook the idea. Then returning to the Syndic's side, he took up his story in a different tone. "The remedium," he said, "my good friend, is in the Grand Duke's Treasury at Turin. It is in a steel box, it is true, but in one with three locks and three keys, sealed with the Grand Duke's private signet and with mine; and laid where the Treasurer himself cannot meddle with it."

The Syndic sat up straight, and with his eyes fixed sullenly on the floor fingered his beard. He was almost persuaded, but not quite. Could it be, could it really be that the thing still existed? That it was still to be obtained, that life by its means was still possible?

"Well?" Basterga said, when the silence had lasted some time.