"Brother, did you say?" asked the dying man. "Did you say brother; are you then the priest? Praise be to God; I shall die easy now," and he buried his face in the pillow and wept for joy.
"Let him lie as he is," whispered Nicholas; "he will be far easier so.
Poor man, he is indeed at the portals of death."
"The leech said so," replied the heart-broken Dorothy, and then for a long time they sat motionless, watching with intense earnestness each movement of the dying man.
The good father wept unrestrainedly. His whole frame quivered with emotion as the sobs escaped his breast; until, after a time, the sounds gradually and yet perceptibly grew weaker and fainter, and finally died away altogether.
"He is dead!" sobbed Dorothy, after a long pause.
"Nay, see," replied her companion, "his bosom heaves, but the end is very near. May my last hour be as calm as this," he added earnestly, as he gazed as the father.
"Amen, so be it, Nicholas Bury," said a voice from the region of the doorway.
The monk started at the sound of his name, but did not move; the tapers were burning before the altar, and the curtain was drawn, and he failed to distinguish the features of the visitor.
Dorothy, even through her ears, noticed that he was startled and discomposed, and she hastened to reassure him.
"No harm, no harm, good father; 'tis but Master John Manners," she said.