ointed-toed shoes, like canoes, and on the head a
little cap edged with gold, half coronet, half smoking cap, it seemed to
her. Where had she ever seen this old-world figure before? She gazed at
him in perplexity.

"Why are you so frightened, Mademoiselle?" said the stranger, and
curiously enough his voice sounded very like that of the most amiable of
her cocked-hat friends.

Sylvia hesitated.

"I don't think I am frightened," she said, and though she spoke English
and the stranger had addressed her in French, he seemed quite to
understand her. "I am only tired, and there was something the matter.
I can't remember what it was."

"I know," replied her visitor. "You can't find Molly and the others.
Never mind. If you come with me I'll take you to them. I know all the ins
and outs of the palace. I have lived here so long, you see."

He held out his hand, but Sylvia hesitated. "Who are you?" she said.

A curious smile flickered over the face before her.

"Don't you know?" he said. "I am surprised at that. I thought you knew me
quite well."

"Are you?" said Sylvia--"yes, I am sure you must be one of the pictures
in the long gallery. I remember looking at you this afternoon. How did
you get down?"

"No," said the stranger, "Mademoiselle is not quite right. How could
there be two 'tout a fait pareils'?" and again his voice sounded exactly
like that of the cocked-hat who would not understand when she had asked
him if he had seen Molly. Yet she still felt sure he was mistaken, he
_must_ be the picture she remembered.

"It is very queer," she said. "If you are not the picture, who are you
then?"

"I pass my time," said the figure, somewhat irrelevantly, "between this
room, where I was killed and the 'Salle des Caryatides,' where I was
married. On the whole I prefer this room."

"Are you--can you be--Henry the Fourth?" exclaimed Sylvia. "Oh! poor
Henry the Fourth, I am so afraid of them coming to kill you again. Come,
let us run quick to the old apple-woman, she will take care of you till
we find grandmother."

She in turn held out her hand. The king took it and held it a moment in
his, and a sad, very sad smile overspread his face.

"Alas!" he said, "I cannot leave the palace. I have no little
grand-daughter like Mademoiselle. I am alone, always alone. Farewell,
my little demoiselle. Les voila qui viennent."

The last words he seemed to speak right into her ears, so clear and loud
they sounded. Sylvia started-