The monastery; The abbot.

158 WAVERLEY NOVELS.
"And I," said the youth, "am neither - and yet - God of Heaven! - I
may be a murderer, unless your aid comes in time to this wounded wretch!"
"Is it even so," said the-traveller; "and do human passions disturb the
breast of nature, even in her deepest solitude? -Yet why should I marvel
that where darkness abides the works of darkness should abound?-By its
fruits is the tree known-Lead on, unhappy youth-I follow thee!"
And with better will to the journey than he had evinced hitherto, the
stranger exerted himself to the uttermost, and seemed to forget his own
fatigue in his efforts to keep pace with his impatient guide.
What was the surprise of Halbert Glendinning, when, upon arriving at
the fatal spot, he saw no appearance of the body of Sir Piercie Shafton!
The traces of the fray were otherwise sufficiently visible. The knight's
cloak' had indeed vanished as well as his body, but his doublet remained
where he had laid it down, and the turf on which he had been stretched was
stained with blood in many a dark crimson spot.
As he gazed round him in terror and astonishment, Halbert's eyes fell
upon the place of sepulture which had so lately appeared to gape for a
victim. It was no longer open, and-it seemed that earth had received the
expected tenant; for the usual narrow hillock was piled over what had
lately been an open grave, and the green sod was adjusted over all with the
accuracy of an experienced sexton. Halbert stood aghast. The idea rushed
on his mind irresistibly, that the earth-heap before him enclosed what had
lately been a living, moving, and sentient fellow-creature, whom, on little
provocation, his fell act had reduced to a clod of the valley, as senseless and
as cold as the turf under which he rested. The hand that scooped the grave
had completed its word; and whose hand could it be save that of the mysterious being of doubtful quality, whom his rashness had invoked, and whom
he had suffered to intermingle in his destinies?
As he stood with clasped hands and uplifted eyes, bitterly ruing his rashness, he was roused by the voice of the stranger, whose suspicions of his
guide had again been awakened by finding the scene so different from what
Halbert had led him to expect.-" Young man," he said, " hast thou baited
thy tongue with falsehood to cut perhaps only a few days from the life of
one whom Nature will soon call home, without guilt on thy part to hasten
his journey?"
" By the blessed Heaven!-by our dear Lady!" ejaculated Halbert —--
"Swear not at all!" said the stranger, interrupting him, "neither by
Heaven, for it is God's throne, nor by earth, for it is his footstool - nor by
the creatures whom he hath made, for they are but earth and clay as we
are. Let thy yea be yea, and thy nay, nay. Tell me in a word, why and
for what purpose thou hast feigned a tale, to lead a bewildered traveller yet
farther astray?"
" As I am a Christian man," said Glendinning, " I left him here bleeding
to death -and now I nowhere spy him, and much I doubt that the tomb
that thou seest has closed on his mortal remains!"
"And who is he for whose fate thou art so anxious?" said the stranger;
"or how is it possible that this wounded man could have been either removed from, or interred in, a place so solitary?"
" His name," said IIalbert, after a moment's pause, " is Piercie Shafton
-there, on that very spot I left him bleeding; and what power has conveyed him hence, I know no more than thou dost."
"Piercie Shafton?" said the stranger; " Sir Piercie Shafton of Wilverton,
a kinsman, as it is said, of the great Piercie of Northumberland? If thou
hast, slain him, to return to the territories of the proud Abbot is to give thy
neck to the gallows. He is well known, that Piercie Shafton; the meddling
tool of wiser plotters-a harebrained trafficker in treason-a champion of
the Pope, employed as a forlorn hope by those more politic heads, who have
more will to work mischief, than valour to encounter danger. - Come with