The "_Teacher of Religion!_" Ay! they needed a teacher, needed a lesson; these aliens, these usurpers, these depravers of women. Yet, in sober truth, Vincent Dering, at that moment sitting in the little balcony alone with Laila Bonaventura, felt quite virtuous. They had just come in from the garden, where they had been strolling and whispering, and now, as they sat together, without a word, scarcely a thought, in the faint light of the young moon and a red jewelled hand-lamp--which Laila, with that unfailing instinct of hers for all that matched the passionate mystery of the place, had set in a carved niche, where it looked like a votive offering to the unseen image of a saint--Vincent could feel the warm ivory of her cheek against his own, hear the soft chink of her jewels as they slid towards him, following the soft warm curves on which they lay. The red light of the lamp glittered faintly in red stars on the myriad facets of looking-glass with which the vaulted roof above them was adorned. It fell, reddening the red lights on the gold-stiffened crimson waves of her dress, that sent such a bewildering perfume to cloud his senses with passionate content. A vast tenderness, a vast triumph, surged through him at the thought of her. Who dared to judge her by the narrow standards of to-day--she, who had gone back boldly to realities! _This_ was what poets had sung since time began; _this_ was what the world had exchanged for Paradise! Juliet! Juliet! And if he was the "_god of her idolatry_," she was to him the "_dearest morsel of earth_." He bent and whispered the name to her with a kiss. And as he did so, a step, swift, bold, masterful, sounded in the passage above; the step of one with a right to be there. Vincent, startled, sat listening; but Laila was on her feet in a second, with a reckless laugh. "Father Laurence!" she cried. "Well! let him come. I'm not afraid! For he loved _her_. He _must_ remember!" So, as a dim figure showed, half seen, in the archway, she stood like a queen, her hand raised, her head thrown back; a sight never to be forgotten. "There is no use in being angry, guardian," she called, in her full-throated voice. "It is too late for that. Remember--" She paused, gave a slight scream, and flung herself before Vincent. There was a flash, a second scream, and then the arches rang with the echoes of a pistol-shot. "Laila! Laila!" "You damned scoundrel! You've killed her!" "Laila! Laila!" There were two voices echoing the woman's name, but only that one pistol-shot. Then two useless clicks of a trigger, before, with an oath, Roshan Khân flung the revolver from him and fled. CHAPTER XX TRAPPED