s.

CHAPTER XXXV.

LADY HOPE IN THE CASTLE.

Lady Clara had been dancing, talking and receiving such homage as would
have satisfied the ambition of a princess. She had managed to snatch
time to exchange many a sweet word and bright look with her lover, and
would have been happy in delicious weariness, but for the sudden
indisposition which had fallen upon her grandmother. As it was she could
hardly realize anything, but gave way to intense weariness, and almost
fell asleep as Margaret was undressing her.

But Caroline had been alone all the evening, within hearing of the
laughter, the music, and feeling the very tread of the dancers in every
nerve. She was young, ardent, and naturally felt a craving wish for the
amusement she had resolutely denied herself; now, less than ever, could
she feel a desire for sleep. Instead of seeking her room she wandered
off to a wing of the castle, in which the picture gallery stretched its
silent range of dead shadows, and tried to throw off the unaccountable
excitement that possessed her, by walking up and down the long gallery.

The late moon was shining through the windows, and a crowd of dimly
outlined figures, in armor or sweeping garments, looked down upon her
from the walls.

Why this strange spirit of unrest had sent her to that gallery she could
not have told, but it was there still, urging her on and on, she could
not tell where, but walked swiftly up and down, up and down, as if
striving to weary herself in a desire for the slumber that seemed to
have fallen upon every human being in the castle.

As she was walking thus wildly, a footstep, not her own, disturbed her.
She stopped to listen--made sure that it was some one advancing, and
drew slowly back toward the wall, hoping to shelter herself among the
low-hanging pictures.

The moonlight, from a neighboring window, lay full upon her as she
retreated across the room, with her face turned down the gallery, and
her breath hushed in fear. She saw, coming toward her, now in shadow,
now in broader light, a lady, in garments of rustling silk, sweeping far
back on the oaken floor, and gleaming duskily, amber-hued in the
imperfect light of a small silver lamp which she carried in her hand--a
beautiful lady, with rubies on her neck and in her hair. The lamplight,
for a moment, concentrated on a face whose weariness was overborne by
slumbering triumph, which poised her head like that of a newly crowned
empress.

Car