ed as one in a dream; yet there was the ceaseless activity of the
eye, the swift, stealthy motion of the hand. He began to attend me, and
I questioned him; but he said he had orders from mademoiselle that he
was to tell nothing--that she, as soon as she could, would visit me.

I felt at once a new spring of life. I gave him the letter I had
written, and bade him deliver it, which he promised to do; for though
there was much in it not vital now, it was a record of my thoughts and
feelings, and she would be glad of it, I knew. I pressed Voban's hand
in leaving, and he looked at me as if he would say something; but
immediately he was abstracted, and left me like one forgetful of the
world.

About three hours after this, as I lay upon the couch in the large room,
clean and well shaven, the door opened, and some one entered, saying to
my guard, "You will remain outside. I have the Governor's order."

I knew the voice; an instant, and I saw the face shining with
expectancy, the eyes eager, yet timid, a small white hand pressed to a
pulsing breast--my one true friend, the jailer of my heart.

For a moment she was all trembling and excited, her hand softly
clutching at my shoulder, tears dripping from her eyes and falling on my
cheek, as hers lay pressed to mine; but presently she grew calm, and her
face was lifted with a smile, and, brushing back some flying locks of
hair, she said in a tone most quaint and touching too, "Poor gentleman!
poor English prisoner! poor hidden lover! I ought not, I ought not," she
added, "show my feelings thus, nor excite you so." My hand was trembling
on hers, for in truth I was very weak. "It was my purpose," she
continued, "to come most quietly to you; but there are times when one
must cry out, or the heart will burst."

I spoke then as a man may who has been delivered from bondage into the
arms of love. She became very quiet, looking at me in her grave, sweet
way, her deep eyes shining with a sincerity.

"Honest, honest eyes," said I--"eyes that never deceive, and never were
deceived."

"All this in spite of what you do not know," she answered. For an
instant a look elfish and childlike came into her eyes, and she drew
back from me, stood in the middle of the floor, and caught her skirts in
her fingers.

"See," she said, "is there no deceit here?"

Then she began to dance softly, her feet seeming hardly to touch the
ground, her body swaying like a tall flower in the wind, her face
al