rted; he had not as yet
remarked the person to whom the voice belonged, and he naturally turned
towards the direction whence it preceded. But, as he felt the cold hand
still resting on his own, he again turned towards the motionless figure
beside him. "Was it you who spoke, madame?" he asked, in a weak voice,
"or is there another person in beside you in the room?"

"Yes," replied the figure, in an almost unintelligible voice, as she
bent down her head.

"Well," said the wounded man, with a great effort, "I thank you. Tell
Madame that I no longer regret to die, since she has remembered me."

At the words "to die," pronounced by one whose life seemed to hang on a
thread, the masked lady could not restrain her tears, which flowed under
the mask, and appeared upon her cheeks just where the mask left her face
bare. If De Guiche had been in fuller possession of his senses, he would
have seen her tears roll like glistening pearls, and fall upon his bed.
The lady, forgetting that she wore her mask, raised her hand as though
to wipe her eyes, and meeting the rough velvet, she tore away her mask
in anger, and threw it on the floor. At the unexpected apparition before
him, which seemed to issue from a cloud, De Guiche uttered a cry and
stretched his arms towards her; but every word perished on his lips, and
his strength seemed utterly abandoning him. His right hand, which had
followed his first impulse, without calculating the amount of strength
he had left, fell back again upon the bed, and immediately afterwards
the white linen was stained with a larger spot than before. In the
meantime, the young man's eyes became dim, and closed, as if he were
already struggling with the messenger of death; and then, after a few
involuntary movements, his head fell back motionless on his pillow; his
face grew livid. The lady was frightened; but on this occasion, contrary
to what is usually the case, fear attracted. She leaned over the young
man, gazed earnestly, fixedly at his pale, cold face, which she almost
touched, then imprinted a rapid kiss upon De Guiche's left hand, who,
trembling as if an electric shock had passed through him, awoke a second
time, opened his large eyes, incapable of recognition, and again
fell into a state of complete insensibility. "Come," she said to her
companion, "we must not remain here any longer; I shall be committing
some folly or other."

"Madame, Madame, your highness is forgetting your mask!" said her
v