"Look here," she said, reverently opening a golden reliquary set with rubies. "Here is a small piece of the holy veil of our foundress, Saint Clare. This is the finger-bone of the blessed Evangelist Matthew. Here is a piece of the hoof of the holy ass on which our Lord rode. Now thou knowest what relics are." "But what can make you keep such things as those?" asked Beatrice, opening wide her lustrous eyes. "And this," enthusiastically added Eularia, opening another reliquary set with emeralds and pearls, "is our most precious relic,--one of the small feathers from the wing of the holy angel, Saint Gabriel." To the intense horror of Eularia, a silver laugh of unmistakable amusement greeted this holy relic. "Beatrice! hast thou no reverence?" "Not for angels' feathers," answered Beatrice, still laughing. "Well, I did think you had more sense!" "I can assure thee, thou wilt shock Father Bruno if thou allowest thyself to commit such improprieties." "I shall shock him, then. How excessively absurd!" Eularia took her unpromising pupil out of the sacristy more hastily than she had led her in. And perhaps it was as well for Beatrice that Father Bruno arrived the next day. They reached Bury Castle in safety. The Countess had been very much interested in Father Bruno's story, and most readily acceded to his request to leave Beatrice as her visitor until he should have a home to which he could take her. And Beatrice de Malpas, the daughter of a baronial house in Cheshire, was a very different person in the estimation of a Christian noble from Belasez, daughter of the Jew pedlar. Rather to her surprise, she found herself seated above the salt, that is, treated as a lady of rank: and the embargo being over which had confined her to Margaret's apartments, she took her place at the Earl's table in the banquet-hall. Earl Hubert's quick eyes soon found out the addition to his supper-party, and he condescended to remark that she was extremely pretty, and quite an ornament to the hall. Beatrice herself was much pleased to find her old friend Doucebelle seated next to her, and they soon began to converse on recent events. It is a curious fact as concerns human nature, that however long friends may have been parted, their conversation nearly always turns on what has happened just before they met again. They do not speak of what delighted or agonised them ten years ago, though the effect may have extended to the whole of their subsequent lives. They talk of last week's journey, or of yesterday's snow-storm. Beatrice fully expected Doucebelle's sympathy on the subject of relics, and she was disappointed to find it not forthcoming. Doucebelle was rather inclined to be shocked than amused. The angel's feather, in her eyes, was provocative of any thing rather than ridicule: and Beatrice, who had anticipated her taking the common-sense view of the matter, felt chilled by the result.