He had been brought to the prison immediately after his murderous attack, and the time had then been about four in the afternoon. It was now night; and all over the city the joy-bells were clashing out music from the Cathedral towers, to express the popular thanksgiving for the miraculous escape and safety of the King. The echo of the chimes which had been ringing ever since sunset, was caught by the sea and thrown back again upon the air, so that it partially drowned the melancholy clang of the prison bell, which in its turn, tolled forth the dreary passing of the time for those to whom liberty had become the merest shadow of a dream. As it struck nine, a priest presented himself to the Superintendent of the prison, bearing a ‘permit’ from General Bernhoff, Head of the Police, to visit and ‘confess’ the prisoner. He was led to the cell and admitted at once. At the noise of a stranger’s entrance, the criminal raised himself from the sunken attitude into which he had fallen on his stone bench, and watched, by the light of the dim lamp set in the wall, the approach of his tall, gaunt, black-garmented visitor with evident horror and fear. When,--with the removal of the shovel hat and thick muffler which had helped to disguise that visitor’s personality,--the features of Monsignor Del Fortis were disclosed, he sprang forward and threw himself on his knees. “Mercy!--Mercy!” he moaned--“Have pity on me, in the name of God!” Del Fortis looked down upon him with contempt, as though he were some loathsome reptile writhing at his feet. “Silence!” he said, in a harsh whisper--“Remember, we are watched here! Get up!--why do you kneel to _me_? I have nothing to do with you, beyond such office as the Church enjoins!” And a cold smile darkened, rather than lightened his features. “I am sent to administer ‘spiritual consolation’ to you!” Slowly the prisoner struggled up to a standing posture, and pressing both hands to his head, he stared wildly before him. “‘Spiritual consolation’!” he muttered--“‘Spiritual’?” A faint dull vacuous smile flickered over his face, and he shuddered. “I understand! You come to prepare my soul for Heaven!” Del Fortis gave him a sinister look. “That depends on yourself!” he replied curtly--“The Church can speed you either way,--to Heaven, or--Hell!” The prisoner’s hands clenched involuntarily with a gesture of despair. “I know that!” he said sullenly--“The Church can save or kill! What of it? I am now beyond even the power of the Church!” Del Fortis seated himself on the stone bench. “Come here!” he said--“Sit down beside me!” The prisoner obeyed.