made some noise with his feet outside the door, like a person who has just arrived and is giving warning of his approach.

“Enter!” cried the archdeacon, from the interior of his cell; “I was expecting you.

I left the door unlocked expressly; enter Master Jacques!”

The scholar entered boldly. The archdeacon, who was very much embarrassed by such a visit in such a place, trembled in his arm-chair. “What! ‘tis you, Jehan?”

“‘Tis a J, all the same,” said the scholar, with his ruddy, merry, and audacious face.

Dom Claude’s visage had resumed its severe expression.

“What are you come for?”