A wooden altar, entirely devoid of fittings and ornament, stood at one end of the room. Before the white and gold door of the tabernacle the sacred stone was missing, leaving a square hole in the wood-work of the altar. But Livette opened a broad door flush with the wall. It opened into a closet in the wall. When the door was thrown wide open, they could see, below a shelf about level with their heads, chasubles and stoles hanging straight and stiff--with great crosses in heavy gold embroidery--suns from which the dove came forth; and mystic triangles, and _Agnus Deis_. Among all the others were vestments for use in mourning ceremonies,--black, with bones and executioners' ladders, hammers and nails, in heavy white embroidery; and--to Livette's amazement--there, in the centre of a stole, on silk as black as night, was worked a crown of thorns in silver, which, in the lamplight, seemed to emit bright rays. On the shelf, above all these priestly vestments--which were arranged with the backs outward, hung in such fashion that you seemed to be looking at the priests standing at the altar--on the shelf, between the goblet and the pyx, shone the consecrated host, a radiant sun, mounted upon a pedestal like a candelabrum; and in the centre of its rays was a gleaming circle of plain glass, which also reflected, in fantastic guise, the flame of the lamp. "Kneel, Renaud!" said Livette. "Prayer is the cure for what is happening to us. Kneel and let us pray!" The drover obeyed. He understood that Livette's purpose was to exorcise fate. She prayed in silence fervently. He, marvelling, unwonted to the attitude of prayer, and striving to keep himself in countenance, looked from time to time at the lamp he held in his hand, raised it to get a better view of the ecclesiastical treasures, and, diverted for the moment, by constant effort, from the perplexity that weighed upon his heart, he was the more wretched when his mind suddenly reverted to Livette. Thereupon he said to himself that she certainly had guessed the truth; that there was, in fact, a spell upon him, and, in his heart, he implored the merciful God of the Cross, the mystic triangle, the symbolical bird and lamb, to come to his aid. [Illustration: Chapter IX _In his left hand was the lamp, which he held shoulder-high, and as far away as possible, to avoid the drops of oil,--and he wound his right arm about Livette's waist as she placed her hand upon the iron rail._] "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us!" Livette suddenly exclaimed, aloud, thinking of the gipsy.--"O God," she added, "we promise Thee that on Saintes-Maries Day, which is near at hand, we will each carry three tapers to their church, and wait, until they are so far consumed, one after the other, in their honor, that our finger-tips are burned!"