ADELINE DE BRIENNE. 189

‘In Damietta!’ exclaimed Walter, astonished; ‘and
how came I to Damietta? My latest recollection is
having been struck from my steed at+Mansourah,
after my lord, the Earl of Salisbury, and all the
English warriors, had fallen before the weapons of
the Saracens; and how I come to be in Damietta is
more than I can guess.’

‘Mayhap; but I can tell you,’ said a frank hearty
voice; and, as Walter started at the sound, Bisset,
the English knight, stood before him; and Adeline
de Brienne, not without casting a kindly look behind,
vanished from the chamber.

‘Wonder upon wonders,’ cried Walter, as the knight
took his hand; ‘I am now more bewildered than
before. Am I in Damietta, and doI see you, and in
the body ?’

‘Even so,’ replied Bisset; ‘and for both cireum-
stances we are wholly indebted to Beltran, the Christian
renegade. He saved you from perishing at Mansou-
rah, and conveyed you down the Nile, and brought
you to the portal of this palace; and he came to me
when I was at Minieh under a tree, sinking with
fatigue, and in danger of bleeding to death; and he
found the means of conveying me hither also; so I
say that, were he ten times a renegade, he merits our
gratitude.’

‘Certes,’ said Walter, ‘and, methinks, also our
prayers that his heart may be turned from the error
of his ways, and that he may return to the faith which
Christians hold.’

‘Amen,’ replied Bisset.

* But tell me, sir knight,’ continued Walter, eagerly,