Once more the men stood in the room they occupied previous to their entrance into the chapel. All seemed loath to speak, being deeply impressed by the ceremony in which they had taken part. At last Fawkes made ready for departure, being desirous of reaching London ere daybreak. As he approached the door of the room the Superior arose and passed toward him. "Friend Guido," said Garnet, as the other stood ready for the journey, "I will not see thee ere thou and Sir Winter return from France. Let thy mind be at ease regarding thy daughter, for in thy absence I will have her under my special care. Hadst better mention to her that she will have a visitor?" "I will be guided by thee in the matter, good father," returned Fawkes; "but," he continued, in a husky tone, "guard her well, for she is very dear to me." "Have no fear," Garnet answered, kindly, laying a hand upon the other's shoulder; "in that will I be as zealous as though she were a daughter of mine own." CHAPTER XV. "THOU SHALT NOT KILL." The deduction made by Winter concerning the silence of Elinor had been correct; but the power he had deemed potent to restrain her from uttering what she had overheard, and from giving voice to the indignities he in his drunkenness had heaped upon her, was not alone the reason of her silence; the mind was held in a species of lethargy. Now her father had left England; the motive which prompted his departure she could surmise,--his mission was an enigma. And who was his companion? The man whose face was ever before her, whose touch haunted her in dreams causing her to awake and cry in terror to the Virgin for protection. The girl was wrought up to a state of hysterical expectancy. Even when sitting within doors, an exclamation upon the street would cause her to start, fearing it might be a voice proclaiming the fulfillment of the awful threat which ever sounded in her ears. Never did she go abroad and behold a group of men but she approached with trembling limbs and nervous eagerness, feeling that the first words falling from their lips would be that England was without a king. What the effect of this anxiety might have been had she brooded over it long in solitude, is not difficult to tell. But solace arose from an unexpected quarter. On his departure for France, Fawkes had mentioned that there was in the city a certain friend, his companion several years before, whom he had again lately met and asked to call from time to time to inquire if he might render any service. The girl awaited the arrival of this visitor with trepidation and some anxiety, being well aware that the companions of her father were, as a rule, men of little refinement, accustomed to the rough life of a camp, and more at their ease in a pot-house than in the society of a young woman. Her expectations were pleasantly disappointed, for on his first visit the stranger, by his ease and grace of manner, banished from her mind all doubts concerning him. Although habited in the garb