im through the
house, where he tried, in turn, every one of the other clocks.

When, at length, he realized that he could accomplish nothing by altering
their striking mechanism--that every clock in the house persisted in
striking five times no matter where the hands were pointing, a sudden,
odd, and inward rage possessed him to hurl the clocks at the wall and
stamp the last vestiges of mechanism out of them.

As they returned together through the hushed and dusky house, he caught
glimpses of faded and depressing tapestries; of vast, tarnished mirrors,
through the dim depths of which their passing figures moved like ghosts;
of rusted stands of arms, and armoured lay figures where cobwebs clotted
the slitted visors and the frail tatters of ancient faded banners drooped.

And he understood why any woman might believe in strange inexplicable
things here in the haunting stillness of this house where splendour had
turned to mould--where form had become effaced and colour dimmed; where
only the shadowy film of texture still remained, and where even that was
slowly yielding--under the attacks of Time's relentless mercenaries, moth
and dust and rust.

CHAPTER X

THE GHOULS

They dined by the latticed window; two candles lighted them; old Anne
served them--old Anne of Faeouette in her wide white coiffe and collarette,
her velvet bodice and her _chaussons_ broidered with the rose.

Always she talked as she moved about with dish and salver--garrulous,
deaf, and aged, and perhaps flushed with the gentle afterglow of that
second infancy which comes before the night.

"_Ouidame!_ It is I, Anne Le Bihan, who tell you this, my pretty
gentleman. I have lived through eighty years and I have seen life begin
and end in the Woods of Aulnes--alas!--in the Woods and the House of
Aulnes----"

"The red wine, Anne," said her mistress, gently.

"Madame the Countess is served.... These grapes grew when I was young,
Monsieur--and the world was young, too, _mon Capitaine--helas!_--but the
Woods of Aulnes were old, old as the headland yonder. Only the sea is
older, _beau jeune homme_--only the sea is older--the sea which always was
and will be."

"Madame," he said, turning toward the young girl beside him, "--to
France!--I have the honour--" She touched her glass to his and they
saluted France with the ancient wine of France--a sip, a faint smile, and
silence through which their eyes still lingered for a moment.

"This year i