had been originally fitted up as a fairy love-palace for a beautiful
creature, possessed of an unquenchable thirst for the fleeting joys of
this earthly existence. Over the richly carved mantelpiece in Blanka's
sleeping-room was what looked like a splendid bas-relief in marble. It
was in reality no bas-relief at all, but a wonderfully skilful bit of
painting, so cleverly imitating the sculptor's chisel that even a closer
inspection failed to detect the deception. It represented a recumbent
Sappho playing on a nine-stringed lyre. The opening in the
sounding-board of the instrument appeared to be a veritable hole over
which real strings were stretched.

This painting Blanka had before her eyes when she lay down to sleep at
night, and it was the first to greet her when she awoke in the morning.
Nor was it simply that she was forced to see it: Sappho seemed able to
make her presence known by other means than by addressing the sight
alone. Mysterious sounds came at times from the lyre,--sometimes simple
chords, and again snatches of love-songs which the princess could have
played over afterward from memory, so plainly did she seem to hear them.
Occasionally, too, the notes of a human voice were heard; and though the
words were muffled and indistinct, as if coming from a distance, the air
was easily followed. These weird melodies came to Blanka's ears nearly
every evening, but she did not venture to tell any one about them. She
tried to persuade herself it was all imagination on her part, and feared
to relate her experience, lest she should incur suspicion of insanity
and be consigned to a less desirable prison than the Cagliari palace.

One evening, as she was preparing to retire, and was standing for a
moment before her mirror, the Sappho seemed to give vent to a ripple of
laughter. The princess was so startled that she dropped the candle she
held in her hand. Once more she heard that mysterious laugh, and then
she beat a hasty retreat to her bed and buried herself in the pillows
and blankets. But, peeping out at length and throwing one more glance at
the picture, which was faintly illumined by her night-lamp, she heard
still another repetition of the mysterious laughter, coming apparently
from a great distance. Was this, too, an illusion, a dream, a trick of
her imagination? If the painted Sappho was alive, why did she give these
signs only at night, and not in the daytime as well?

November came, and with it rainy days,