The Preceptor Albert waited impatiently in an adjacent chamber the return of Bois-Guilbert.

“Thou hast tarried long,” he said; “I have been as if stretched on red-hot iron with very impatience. What if the Grand Master, or his spy Conrade, had come hither? I had paid dear for my complaisance.⁠—But what ails thee, brother?⁠—Thy step totters, thy brow is as black as night. Art thou well, Bois-Guilbert?”

“Ay,” answered the Templar, “as well as the wretch who is doomed to die within an hour.⁠—Nay, by the rood, not half so well⁠—for there be those in such state, who can lay down life like a cast-off garment. By Heaven, Malvoisin, yonder girl hath well-nigh unmanned me. I am half resolved to go to the Grand Master, abjure the Order to his very teeth, and refuse to act the brutality which his tyranny has imposed on me.”