"What! lay aside the dress of my order?" cried Donatus horrified. "I can never do that--the rules forbid it."
"Then you must stop here till night-fall--one or the other is the only possible course."
Donatus wrung his hands, "What can I do? disobedience and infraction of the rule are my fate wherever I turn. And yet if I must infringe one law it had better be the lesser. More depends on my saving the brethren than on the outward observance. Call the man here for God's sake; I will change clothes with him that I may go on unrecognised."
"But--one thing more," said Beata reflecting. "If afterwards the Count were to see the man in your monk's cowl--that might betray you. I would rather burn it and give the shepherd something more valuable for his smock frock."
"Have you any valuables then?" asked Donatus in surprise.
"Yes--here, feel; I have a ring that Count Reichenberg gave me. At first I flung it away, but my mother put it on me again, and said, 'who knows of what use it may be yet!'"
"The Count gave you a ring?"
"Aye--and a gold piece. That I have kept--we can buy bread with that when we have none left. He gave them both to me that night. The ring I was to show to the warder of the castle that he might admit me. He wanted to adopt me as his child."
"And you did not go?"
The child smiled.