eve that the strange lady was in fact a
work-girl; still, this assumed indifference could not altogether cloak
the timidity of a courtier who respects a royal incognity. At this
moment six was striking by the clock of Saint-Denis du Pas, a small
church that stood between Notre-Dame and the Port-Saint-Landry--the
first church erected in Paris, on the very spot where Saint-Denis was
laid on the gridiron, as chronicles tell. The hour flew from steeple to
tower all over the city. Then suddenly confused shouts were heard on
the left bank of the Seine, behind Notre-Dame, in the quarter where the
schools of the University harbored their swarms.

At this signal, Jacqueline's elder lodger began to move about his room.
The sergeant, his wife, and the strange lady listened while he opened
and shut his door, and the old man's heavy step was heard on the steep
stair. The constable's suspicions gave such interest to the advent of
this personage, that the lady was startled as she observed the strange
expression of the two countenances before her. Referring the terrors
of this couple to the youth she was protecting--as was natural in a
lover--the young lady awaited, with some uneasiness, the event thus
heralded by the fears of her so-called master and mistress.

The old man paused for a moment on the threshold to scrutinize the three
persons in the room, and seemed to be looking for his young companion.
This glance of inquiry, unsuspicious as it was, agitated the three.
Indeed, nobody, not even the stoutest man, could deny that Nature
had bestowed exceptional powers on this being, who seemed almost
supernatural. Though his eyes were somewhat deeply shaded by the wide
sockets fringed with long eyebrows, they were set, like a kite's eyes,
in eyelids so broad, and bordered by so dark a circle sharply defined on
his cheek, that they seemed rather prominent. These singular eyes had
in them something indescribably domineering and piercing, which took
possession of the soul by a grave and thoughtful look, a look as bright
and lucid as that of a serpent or a bird, but which held one fascinated
and crushed by the swift communication of some tremendous sorrow, or of
some super-human power.

Every feature was in harmony with this eye of lead and of fire, at once
rigid and flashing, stern and calm. While in this eagle eye earthly
emotions seemed in some sort extinct, the lean, parched face also bore
traces of unhappy passions and great deeds don