After whispering a word to the _frere portier_, the errant daughter of the noble house of Guise was led through the long and narrow passages of the building, not to the parlour which usually formed the place of reception by the priors of the convent, but to a small room, which had but one door for entrance, and but one narrow window to admit the needful light. The furniture was as simple as it could be, consisting of five or six long-backed ebony chairs, a table, a crucifix, a missal, and a human skull, not, as usual, nicely cleaned and polished, so as to take away all idea of corruption from the round, smooth, meaningless ball of shining bone, but rough and foul as it came from the earth, with the black dirt sticking in the hollows where once had shone the light of life, and the green mould of the grave spreading faint and sickly over the fleshless chaps. Standing before the table, with his arms crossed upon his breast, and his dark gleaming eye fixed upon the memento of the tomb, stood a tall pale man, habited in the black robe of a prior of the order of St. Dominick, with the white under-garment of the Dominicans still apparent. He raised his eyes as the Duchess entered, but fixed them again immediately upon the skull; and, ere he proceeded to notice in words the approach of his visitant, he muttered what appeared to be a brief prayer, and bowed towards the cross. "Welcome, madam!" he said, at length; "I have been eagerly expecting you; for it will not be long ere vespers, and we have much to consider." "I have been forced to delay," replied the Duchess, "in order to save some of our very best schemes from going wrong. But is not Armandi come? He should have been here an hour ago." "He is here, though he has not been here so long," replied the Prior. "I made them keep him without till you came; for I love not his neighbourhood." "I ought to pray your forgiveness, father, for bringing him here at all," said the Duchess; "but, in truth--"