"This know I, Master Thomas Marsh," said the stranger gravely, "that thy life is even now perilled: evil practices are against thee; but no matter, thou art quit for the nonce--other hands than mine have saved thee! Thy pains are over. Hark! _the clock strikes One!_" As he spoke, a single toll from the bell-tower of Bilsington came, wafted by the western breeze, over the thick-set and lofty oaks which intervened between the Frith and what had been once a priory. Dr. Aldrovando turned as the sound came floating on the wind, and was moving, as if half in anger, towards the other side of the stage, where the mountebank, his fires extinct, was now disgorging to the admiring crowd yard after yard of gaudy-coloured riband. "Stay! Nay, prithee, stay!" cried Marsh eagerly, "I was wrong; in faith I was. A change, and that a sudden and most marvellous, hath come over me; I am free; I breathe again; I feel as though a load of years had been removed; and--is it possible?--hast thou done this?" "Thomas Marsh!" said the doctor, pausing, and turning for the moment on his heel, "I have _not_; I repeat, that other and more innocent hands than mine have done this deed. Nevertheless, heed my counsel well! Thou art parlously encompassed; I, and I only, have the means of relieving thee. Follow thy courses; pursue thy journey; but, as thou valuest life, and more than life, be at the foot of yonder woody knoll what time the rising moon throws her first beam upon the bare and blighted summit that towers above its trees." He crossed abruptly to the opposite quarter of the scaffolding, and was in an instant deeply engaged in listening to those whom the cow's horn had attracted, and in prescribing for their real or fancied ailments. Vain were all Marsh's efforts again to attract his notice; it was evident that he studiously avoided him; and when, after an hour or more spent in useless endeavour, he saw the object of his anxiety seclude himself once more within his canvass screen, he rode slowly and thoughtfully off the field.--What should he do? Was the man a mere quack? an impostor? His name thus obtained!--that might be easily done. But then, his secret griefs; the doctor's knowledge of them; their cure: for he felt that his pains were gone, his healthful feelings restored! True; Aldrovando, if that were his name, had disclaimed all co-operation in his recovery: but he knew or, he announced it. Nay, more; he had hinted that he was yet in jeopardy; that practices--and the chord sounded strangely in unison with one that had before vibrated within him--that practices were in operation against his life! It was enough! He would keep tryst with the Conjuror, if conjuror he were; and, at least, ascertain who and what he was, and how he had become acquainted with his own person and secret afflictions.