keys in his hands.

"I have seen Trumence to bed," he said. "You can come now, madam."

Dionysia was all ready.

"Let us go," she said simply.

Then she followed the jailer along interminable passages, through a
vast vaulted hall, in which their steps resounded as in a church, then
through a long gallery. At last, pointing at a massive door, through the
cracks of which the light was piercing, he said,--

"Here we are."

But Dionysia seized his arm, and said in an almost inaudible voice,--

"Wait a moment."

She was almost overcome by so many successive emotions. She felt her
legs give way under her, and her eyes become dim. In her heart she
preserved all her usual energy; but the flesh escaped from her will and
failed her at the last moment.

"Are you sick?" asked the jailer. "What is the matter?"

She prayed to God for courage and strength: when her prayer was
finished, she said,--

"Now, let us go in."