on
my cheeks. Always the shouts were distant, the scent faint, the
laughter low. I wandered up faery glades, loitered in lazy markets,
listened to the music of fountains, sat before ample boards, bowed over
lily-white hands....

Here, then, was magic. Things other than silk went to the weaving of
so potent a spell. The laborious needle put in the dainty threads: the
hearts of those that plied it put in most precious memories--treasures
of love and laughter ... the swift brush of lips ... the echo of a call
in the forest ... a patch of sunlight upon the slope of a hill ... such
stuff, indeed, as dreams are made on....

And there is the bare truth, gentlemen, just as I have stumbled upon
it. The tapestries of Pau are dreams--which you may go and share any
day except Sundays.

We had almost finished our tour of the apartments, and were standing in
the Bedroom of Jeanne d'Albret, staring at a beautiful Gobelin, when I
heard the "flop" of something alighting upon the floor.

With one consent, the keeper, Susan, and I swung on our heels.

Advancing stiffly towards us and wagging his scrap of a tail was a
small grey-brown dog. His coat was plastered with filth, upon one of
his ears was a blotch of dried blood, his muzzle and paws might have
been steeped in liquid soot. He stank abominably.

I put up a hand to my head.

"Nobby?" I cried, peering. And then again, "_Nobby?_"

The urchin crept to my feet, put his small dirty head on one side,
lowered it to the ground, and then rolled over upon his back. With his
legs in the air, he regarded me fixedly, tentatively wagging his tail.

Dazedly I stooped and patted the mud upon his stomach....

The bright eyes flashed. Then, with a squirm, the Sealyham was on his
feet and leaping to lick my face.

"B-b-but," shrieked Susan, shaking me by the arm, "is this the--the dog
you'd lost?"

"Yes," I shouted, "it is!"

Not until then did the custodian of the apartments find his tongue.

"It is your dog, then!" he raved. "He has marched with us all the
time, and I have not seen him. Without an attachment in all these
noble rooms! _Mon Dieu!_ dogs may not enter even the grounds, but he
must junket in the Chateau, all vile as he is and smelling like twenty
goats."

"Listen," said I. "It's my dog all right, but I never brought him.
I've been looking all over Pau. What on earth----"

"But you must have brought him. It is evident. Myself I have shut all
the doors