With this, she again embraced Paula, who as she went out to enter the
chariot also bestowed a farewell kiss on Eudoxia and Mandane, for they,
too, stood modestly weeping in the background; then she gave her hand to
the hump-backed gardener, and to the Masdakite, down whose cheeks tears
were rolling. At this moment Katharina stood in her path, seized her arm
in mortified excitement, and said insistantly:

"And have you not a word for me?"

Paula freed herself from her clutch and said in a low voice: "I thank you
for lending me the chariot. As you know, it is taking me to prison, and
I fear it is your perfidy that has brought me to this. If I am wrong,
forgive me--if I am right, your punishment will hardly be lighter than my
fate. You are still young, Katharina; try to grow better."

And with this she stepped into the chariot with old Betta, and the last
she saw was little Mary who threw herself sobbing into Joanna's arms.




CHAPTER XIV.

Susannah had never particularly cared for Paula, but her fate shocked her
and moved her to pity. She must at once enquire whether it was not
possible to send her some better food than the ordinary prison-fare.
That was but Christian charity, and her daughter seemed to take her
friend's misfortune much to heart. When she and Martina returned home
she looked so cast down and distracted that no stranger now would ever