Unorna sprang to her feet and hastily opened the gate of the railing. In a moment she was standing by the altar at Beatrice’s head. She could see that the dark eyes were open now. The great shock had recalled her to consciousness.
“Where am I?” she asked in great distress, seeing nothing in the darkness now, and groping with her hands.
“Sleep--be silent and sleep!” said Unorna in low, firm tones, pressing her palm upon the forehead.
“No--no!” cried the startled woman in a voice of horror. “No--I will not sleep--no, do not touch me! Oh, where am I--help! Help!”
She was not hurt. With one strong, lithe movement, she sprang to the ground and stood with her back to the altar, her hands stretched out to defend herself from Unorna. But Unorna knew what extreme danger she was in if Beatrice left the church awake and conscious of what had happened. She seized the moving arms and tried to hold them down, pressing her face forward so as to look into the dark eyes she could but faintly distinguish. It was no easy matter, however, for Beatrice was young and strong and active. Then all at once she began to see Unorna’s eyes, as Unorna could see hers, and she felt the terrible influence stealing over her again.
“No--no--no!” she cried, struggling desperately. “You shall not make me sleep. I will not--I will not!”
There was a flash of light again in the church, this time from behind the high altar, and the noise of quick footsteps. But neither Unorna nor Beatrice noticed the light or the sound. Then the full glow of a strong lamp fell upon the faces of both and dazzled them, and Unorna felt a cool thin hand upon her own. Sister Paul was beside them, her face very white and her faded eyes turning from the one to the other.
It was very simple. Soon after Compline was over the nun had gone to Unorna’s room, had knocked and had entered. To her surprise Unorna was not there, but Sister Paul imagined that she had lingered over her prayers and would soon return. The good nun had sat down to wait for her, and telling her beads had fallen asleep. The unaccustomed warmth and comfort of the guest’s room had been too much for the weariness that constantly oppressed a constitution broken with ascetic practices. Accustomed by long habit to awake at midnight to attend the service, her eyes opened of themselves, indeed, but a full hour later than usual. She heard the clock strike one, and for a moment could not believe her senses. Then she understood that she had been asleep, and was amazed to find that Unorna had not come back. She went out hastily into the corridor. The lay sister had long ago extinguished the hanging lamp, but Sister Paul saw the light streaming from Beatrice’s open door. She went in and called aloud. The bed had not been touched. Beatrice was not there. Sister Paul began to think that both the ladies must have gone to the midnight service. The corridors were dark and they might have lost their way. She took the lamp from the table and went to the balcony at which the guests performed their devotion. It had been her light that had flashed across the door of the tabernacle. She had looked down into the choir, and far below her had seen a figure, unrecognisable from that height in the dusk of the church, but clearly the figure of a woman standing upon the altar. Visions of horror rose before her eyes of the sacrilegious practices of witchcraft, for she had thought of nothing else during the whole evening. Lamp in hand she descended the stairs to the choir and reached the altar, providentially, just in time to save Beatrice from falling a victim again to the evil fascination of the enemy who had planned the destruction of her soul as well as of her body.