A little maid, sweet and innocent, looked over the churchyard wall; she spied something that pleased her.

She climbed over to get it--and was not.
"Oh, I could tell you of a thousand such if I had time," shrilled the thin treble of the cripple in their eager ears, "if I dared--if I only dared!" "Dared," said Malise; "why man--what is the matter with you?
None could hear you but we three men." "My wife--my wife," he quavered; "I bid you be silent, or at least speak not so loud.

La Meffraye she is called--she can hear all things.
See--" He made a sudden movement and bared his right arm.

It was withered to the shoulder and of a dark purple colour approaching black.
"La Meffraye did that," he gasped; "she blasted it because I would not do the evil she wished." "Then why do you not kill her ?" said Malise, whose methods were not subtle.

"If she were mine, I would throttle her, and give her body to the hounds." "Hush, I bid you be silent for dear God's sake in whom I believe," again came the voice of the cripple.