unconsciousness lasted in point of fact but for a few minutes. Yet
to Richard those minutes were as years, as centuries. At length, still
heavy with dreamless slumber, he was aware of the stealthy turning of a
key in a lock. Little padding foot-falls, soft as those of some strong,
yet dainty, cat-creature crossed the carpet. A whisper of silk came
along with them, like the murmur of the breeze in an oak grove on a
clear, hot, summer noon, or the sibilant ripple of the sea upon spaces
of fine-ribbed, yellow sand. And the impression produced upon Richard
was delicious, as of one passing from a close room into the open air.
Confusion and exhaustion left him. Energy returned. The energy of
breeding fever merely, yet to him it appeared that of refreshment, of
renewed and abounding health. He was conscious, too, of a will outside
himself, acting upon his will--a will self-secure, impregnable, working
with triumphant daring towards a single end. It certainly was
unmaimed--in its present manifestation in any case. It told, and with
assurance, of completion, of attainment. Yielding himself to it, with
something of the recklessness a man yields himself to the poison which
yet promises relief, Richard opened his eyes.

Before him stood Helen de Vallorbes. In one hand she carried a little
lamp. In the other her high-heeled, cloth-of-gold slippers. Her feet
were bare. In the haste of the journey, from her bedchamber up-stairs
through the great rooms and down the marble stairs, the fronts of the
sea-blue, sea-green dressing-gown she wore had flown apart, thus
disclosing not only her delicate night-dress, but--since this last was
fine to the point of transparency--all the secret loveliness of her
body and her limbs. Her shining hair curled low upon her forehead, half
concealed her pretty ears, and lay upon her shoulders like a little,
golden cape. And, from out this brightness of her hair, the exultant
laughter bubbling in her throat, the small lamp carried high in one
hand, she looked down at Richard Calmady.

"I waited till the hours grew old and you did not come to me, so I have
come to you, Dickie," she said. "Let what will happen to-morrow, this
very certainly shall happen to-night--that with you and me Love shall
have his own way, speak his own language, be worshipped with the rites,
be found in the sacraments, ordained by himself, and to which all
nature is, and has been, obedient since life on earth first began!"

Not till