So here in the ancient Red Tower, I thought, we might at least be safe enough till my good fellows of Plassenburg, with the Prince at their head, should swarm hammering at the gates of Thorn.

To us, sitting thus hand in hand, there entered the Bishop Peter.

“Hail!” he said, blandly, and in his grandest manner, as we knelt for his benediction; “hail, bride and bridegroom!  God has been good to you this day.  Bishop Peter, the least of His servants, greets you very well.  May you have long life and prosperity unfailing.”

I thanked him for his gracious words.

“The folk of the city are full of joy,” he said.  “I think they would almost proclaim you Duke to-day.”

“I desire no such perilous honor,” I replied, smiling; “it were indeed an ill-omen to have a Duke habited all in red.”

“It is your marriage-dress, Hugo,” said Helene; “I will not have you speak against it.”

Ever since the strain of the scaffold she had not once broke down—­no, nor wept—­but only desired to sit very close beside me, touching me sometimes, as if to make sure that I was real.  Deliverance had been too great and sudden, and those things which had come so near to us both—­Death and the Beyond—­had left a salt and bitter spray on our lips.

“And what of the Lady Ysolinde?” I asked of the Bishop.

Now the Bishop Peter was a good man, but, like many of his brethren, a lover of great, swelling words.

“The Lady Ysolinde,” he said, oratorically, “by the immediate assistance of the city guard, was placed in a litter and deported, all unconscious as she was, to her father’s house in the Weiss Thor, where she still remains.  But her most seasonable extract from the laws of the Wolfmark, which so opportunely saved the life of your fair wife, and led to this present happy consummation, I have here by me, even in my hand.”

And with that the Bishop drew the rolled parchment from his pocket and handed it to me, with all the original seals depending from it.  Now I have small gift for the deciphering of such ancient documents, being only skilled in the common script of the day, and not over-well in that.  So that I had to depend upon the offices of Bishop Peter for the interpretation.

“I think,” said the Bishop, after he had finished reading it over, “that this document had best remain in my own possession.  It may be safer under the seal and protection of the Church—­even as, to speak truth, you and your wife would also be.  I am a plain man,” the Bishop continued, after a pause, “but remember that there is ever a place of refuge at the palace—­and one which even Duke Otho is not likely to violate, remembering the experiences of his predecessor, Duke Casimir, when he crossed his sword against the crosier of this unworthy servant of Holy Church.”

“I thank you,” said I.  “I would that it were possible to avail myself of your all too generous offer.  But it will be necessary to abide at least this one night in the Red Tower.”