nightmare and never should awake. I pulled
the necklaces, the bracelets, the rings, off me, struggling with the
tangled chains and stubborn clasps. I shook my hand free of the last
jewel, and then snatching up my turban, pinned it on with trembling
fingers, and all the while she stood looking silently at me. One could
not tell what was behind her face. But when, at last, I had taken up
the little ball of my gloves and stood before her, she spoke in a very
soft voice:

"Pardon me, I have lost my wits. But you are made of a material--I do
not know it--but it is not flesh and blood. Nevertheless we must not
part bad friends."

She turned to the table and, pushing aside the jewels as if they had
been colored glass, pulled toward her a tray, and took up a glass
decanter. She poured two glasses of wine, and taking one, gracefully
held it out to me. "Will you not drink to his acquittal?" she asked.

"Forgive me," I said, "if I do not drink to it. I will wish for it
with all my heart. That will be the same."

"But it is not," she said, advancing, with her bright eyes fixed upon
me. "To drink--that is a deed which shows the good will. The rest is
but words. Come, you have spoken of great things you would do for him
if only you could. Well, here is one small thing. Let me see you make
good your words!" Her voice was so sweetly coaxing my hand hesitated
toward the glass. Then, as she thought I was going to take it,
something in the expectant, intense look of her caught me; and a
dreadful thought flashed into my mind.

I shrank back. "No," I said, "I can not!"

But she was fairly upon me with it. She was leaning over me. "Drink,
yes, drink!" She thrust it upon me.

"No, no!" I cried in terror. "I will not!" I flung up my hand with
the impulse to keep it off me, and struck the glass, and overturned it.

She stepped backward and set down the tray with a clang. There was no
perceptible change in her face, but suddenly she had become terrible.
"You shall never go out of my house," she said.

My ears wouldn't believe, my senses rejected the meaning of those
words. "You would not do such a thing--you would not dare!"

She threw back her head until I could see the great column of her white
throat swell, and laughed. "I tell you, my pretty little girl, I would
fling away a dozen such as you for only the chance of saving him!"

I saw that she meant it--I understood how well!--I felt like a little
dry