As if in answer to his speech, one of the servants entered with a telegram, which proved to be from the doctor. Montrose opened it when the maid had left the room, and found the message rather cryptic: also unsigned, save by the initial "E." It ran: "Matthew x. 23, twelve words!" "Look up the text, Alice," said the young man eagerly. The girl, luckily having the Bible with her, rapidly skimmed over the leaves and took the book to the window to read the small print in the fast-failing light. "But when they persecute you in this city, flee ye into another," she read slowly, and would have continued the verse, but that her lover stopped her with a gesture. "Those are the twelve words," he said, folding up the telegram. "The rest of the verse doesn't matter. So Eberstein wants me to fly. I wonder why," and he looked woefully disappointed. "Take his advice," said Alice eagerly, and glad that such a powerful opinion backed her up. "You always obey him, you know." "Yes. All the same I did not think he would tell me to sneak away. It seems to be cowardly: it seems like admitting guilt." "I said in London that I believed in Dr. Eberstein and I say the same now, Douglas," was Alice's decided answer. "He knows more than we do about things, as he prophesied that we should have trouble. Do what he says." Montrose frowned and bit his lip, for his faith in the doctor was being sorely tried. He never expected to get advice coinciding with that of Alice. And the idea of flight was opposed to his sense of manhood. All the same there was no sense in being heedlessly rash, and undoubtedly Eberstein must have some powerful reason to telegraph as he had done. Alice watched his changing face eagerly and inwardly prayed that he might yield. She saw no safety for the present but in flight. Finally with a sigh he took her face between his two hands and kissed her. "I shall go to your cave," he murmured, but winced at such resignation to what he regarded as an ignoble course. The two put the plan into execution at once and stole away across the moor into the gathering night after certain preparations. In the space of an hour Alice regained her room, and was apparently innocent of what had taken place. But Douglas was safe in the unknown cave with a scanty store of food, and wine, and a few candles. "Gone," said Enistor furiously. "Then he is guilty after all." CHAPTER XX THE UNEXPECTED