“He lives, lady, but he is not well, for the wound in his thigh has festered and he cannot walk, or even stand. Nay, have no fear, time and clean dressing will heal him, and he lies in a safe place.” In the rapture of her relief Elsa seized the woman’s hand, and would have kissed it. “Touch it not, it is bloodstained,” said Martha, drawing her hand away. “Blood? Whose blood is on it?” asked Elsa, shrinking back. “Whose blood?” answered Martha with a hollow laugh; “why that of many a Spanish man. Where, think you, lady, that the Mare gallops of nights? Ask it of the Spaniards who travel by the Haarlemer Meer. Aye, and now Red Martin is with me and we run together, taking our tithe where we can gather it.” “Oh! tell me no more,” said Elsa. “From day to day it is ever the same tale, a tale of death. Nay, I know your wrongs have driven you mad, but that a woman should slay——” “A woman! I am no woman; my womanhood died with my husband and my son. Girl, I tell you that I am no woman; I am a Sword of God myself appointed to the sword. And so to the end I kill, and kill and kill till the hour when I am killed. Go, look in the church yonder, and see who hangs to the high arm of the Rood—the fat Abbe Dominic. Well, I sent him there to-night; to-morrow you will hear how I turned parson and preached a sermon—aye, and Ramiro and Adrian called van Goorl, and Simon the spy, should have joined him there, only I could not find them because their hour has not come. But the idols are down and the paintings burnt, and the gold and silver and jewels are cast upon the dung-heap. Swept and garnished is the temple, made clean and fit for the Lord to dwell in.” “Made clean with the blood of murdered priests, and fit by the smoke of sacrilege?” broke in Elsa. “Oh! woman, how can you do such wicked things and not be afraid?” “Afraid?” she answered. “Those who have passed through hell have no more fear; death I seek, and when judgment comes I will say to the Lord: What have I done that the Voice which speaks to me at night did not tell me to do? Look down, the blood of my husband and my son still smokes upon the ground. Hearken, Lord God, it cries to Thee for vengeance!” and as she spoke she lifted her blackened hands and shook them. Then she went on.