How long he had been there in dread and wonder he did not know, when two cloaked and hooded figures emerged slowly out of the gloom. He could not tell whence they came or whether they had been there all the time. They bent their steps towards the sacristy and, as they were about to pass Tristan in his hiding-place, they paused as if conscious of another presence. "As we proceed in this matter," whispered the one voice, "I grow fearful. You know my relations to the Senator--" "Your anxiety moves me not," croaked the other voice. "Deem you to attain your ends by mortal means?" The voice caused Tristan to shudder as with an ague, though he saw not him who spoke. "What of yourself?" whispered the first speaker. "Have you forgotten," came the hoarse reply, "that either I am soulless, or else my spirit, damned from its beginning, will scarce be saved by the grace of Him I dare not name! You are defiled in the very conversing with me." The tone in which these words were spoken, either defied answer, or, if a response was made, it did not reach Tristan's ears as they slowly, noiselessly, proceeded upon their way. Tristan vaguely listened for the echo of their retreating footsteps as, passing behind the altar, they disappeared, as if the earth had swallowed them. Now he was seized with a terrible fear. What, if they were to repeat the sacrilege? He thought he recognized the voice of the first speaker; but this no doubt was but a trick of his excited imagination. Determined to prevent so terrible a crime, he crept cautiously down the narrow passage through which they had disappeared. Six steps he counted, then he found himself in a room which seemed to be part of the sacristy, yet not a part, for a postern stood open through which gleamed the misty moonlight. There was little doubt in Tristan's mind that they had passed out through this postern which had been left unguarded, and he found his conjectures confirmed, when his eye, accustoming itself to the radiance without, saw two misty figures passing along the road that leads past the Coelian Hill through fields of ruins. Taking care so they would not be attracted by the sound of his steps, Tristan crept in the shadows of roofless columns, shattered porticoes and dismantled temples, half hidden amid the dark foliage that sprang up among the very fanes and palaces of old. At times he lost sight of his quarry. Again they would rise up before him like evil spirits wandering through space. As Tristan continued in his pursuit, he began to be beset by dire misgivings. The twain had vanished as utterly as if the earth had swallowed them and he paused in his pursuit to gain his bearings. Had he followed two phantoms or two beings in the flesh? Had he abandoned his watch for two penitents who had perchance been locked in the church? What might not be happening at the Lateran at this very moment! How would Don Garcia construe his absence?