"I suggested it," he answered, in a louder voice, not without some self-satisfaction. "It appeared to me to meet the exigencies of the case admirably, and it will be very useful, let me tell you, at home. It will emphasize the difficulties and dangers we have to contend against. It will show our meek reasonableness, and then--" he looked round with a jubilant smile--"it seems to me such a beautiful idea that the only result of this attempt to gag us will be that the thousands of poor benighted souls will have a chance of hearing the Truth in many places instead of one." But Erda's voice broke in on the hum of applause almost harshly, filling the room with its defiance. "I think it cowardly; I would fight--if I were a man." "You would beat Jean Ziska's drum!" laughed Vincent Dering, rising from the music stool where he had been holding Laila's hand under cover of the new song,--an occupation which always made him feel as if all the wine of life had gone to his head. "You refused my sword just now, Miss Shepherd, so I place my drumstick at your disposal." So, with a reckless gaiety, he seized on a painted tambourine which good Mrs. Campbell had hung as an ornament on the wall,--it was bedaubed with two white lilies and a butterfly rampant,--and catching up a teaspoon from the table, he began to sing in his pretty, light-comedy voice, "Oh! dem golden slippers!" while the tambourine, under his skilful drumming, throbbed to the words:-- "Golden slippers on a golden stair, Golden slippers on my tired feet, Golden slippers dat we all mus' wear Becos' dey are so sweet." He sang well, he played better; and both voice and drumming echoed out through the open windows. "They are singing in the _missen_," said the people in the courtyard to the pilgrims, who were still gathering to the miracles, like moths round a candle. "It is not wise to listen; folk become as they are, if they do." Some of the pilgrims laughed and some stopped their ears; but even so, the throbbing of the tambourine was in the air. "Golden slippers on a golden stair, Golden slippers on my tired feet, Golden slippers dat we all mus' wear." CHAPTER XVI ECHOES