and
sparkling, after her windy, twilight walk.

"I have outstripped the storm after all, you see," she remarked as she
went by. "I don't believe we shall have it before midnight. Oh,
Claudine! is my lady in her room? I have been on an errand for her
down the village."

She had encountered the jaunty little French girl on the upper landing,
and paused to put the question.

"Yes," Claudine said. "Madame's headache was easier. She is reading
in her dressing-room."

Sybilla tapped at the dressing-room door, then turned the handle and
entered. It was an exquisite little _bijou_ of a chamber, with fluted
walls of rose silk, and delicious plump beauties with bare shoulders
and melting eyes, by Greuze. A wood fire flickered on the marble
hearth, and was flashed back from lofty mirrors as tall as the room.

Lying back in an arm-chair, her book fallen aimlessly on her lap, her
dark, deep eyes looking straight before her into the evening gloaming,
my lady sat alone.

The melancholy wash of the waves on the shore, the mournful sighing of
the evening wind among the groaning trees, the monotonous ticking of a
dainty buhl clock, and the light fall of the cinders sounded abnormally
loud in the dead silence of the apartment.

Lady Kingsland turned round at the opening of the door, and her face
hardened into that cold look it always wore at sight of her husband's
brilliant protegee.

"I have been to the village, my lady," Sybilla said. "I have seen Mr.
Parmalee. He will be in the Beech Walk precisely at eight."

My lady bent her head in cold acknowledgment. Sybilla paused an
instant, determined to make her speak.

"Can I be of service to you in any way in this matter, my lady?" she
asked.

"You?" in proud surprise. "Certainly not. I wish to be alone, Miss
Silver. Be good enough to go."

Sybilla's little brown fist clinched itself furiously, once on the
landing outside.

"I can't humble her!" she thought. "I can't make her fear me. I can't
triumph over her, do what I will. I have her secret and I hold her in
my power, but she is prouder than Lucifer himself, and she would let me
stand forth and tell all, and if one pleading word would stop me, she
would not say it. 'The brave may die, but can not yield!' She should
have been a man."

She went to the window and drew out her watch; it wanted a quarter of
eight.

"In fifteen minutes my lady goes; in fifteen more I shall follow her,
and not alone. I a