III. Dark Plottings 240 IV. Face to Face 250 V. The Cressets of Doom 259 VI. A Meeting of Ghosts 269 VII. A Bower of Eden 279 VIII. An Italian Night 289 IX. The Net of the Fowler 299 X. Devil Worship 307 XI. By Lethe's Shores 314 XII. The Death Watch 323 XIII. The Convent in Trastevere 335 XIV. The Phantom of the Lateran 341 BOOK THE FOURTH I. The Return of the Moor 351 II. The Escape from San Angelo 356 III. The Lure 367 IV. A Lying Oracle 377 V. Bitter Waters 384 VI. From Dream to Dream 389 VII. A Roman Medea 402 VIII. In Tenebris 413 IX. The Conspiracy 419 X. The Broken Spell 427 XI. The Black Mass 440 XII. Sunrise 453 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Page "It was that of a man coming towards her." (_See page 143_) _Frontispiece_ "A strange look passed into Theodora's eyes" 83 "Pelting the dancing girls for idle diversion" 192 "Thrown her saffron scarf over the prostrate youth" 236 BOOK THE FIRST UNDER THE WITCHES' MOON CHAPTER I THE FIRES OF ST. JOHN It was the eve of St. John in the year of our Lord Nine Hundred Thirty-Five. High on the cypress-clad hills of the Eternal City the evening sun had flamed valediction, and the last lights of the dying day were fading away on the waves of the Tiber whose changeless tide has rolled down through centuries of victory and defeat, of pride and shame, of glory and disgrace. The purple dusk began to weave its phantom veil over the ancient capital of the Cæsars and a round blood-red moon was climbing slowly above the misty crests of the Alban Hills, draining the sky of its crimson sunset hues. The silvery chimes of the Angelus, pealing from churches and convents, from Santa Maria in Trastevere to Santa Maria of the Aventine, began to sing their message of peace into the heart of nature and of man.