woman between two seas.

Now to the north of Balthazar's home stood a tall forest, overhanging
both the highway and the river whose windings the highway followed.
Graciosa was very often to be encountered upon the outskirts of these
woods. She loved the forest, whose tranquillity bred dreams, but was
already a woman in so far that she found it more interesting to watch
the highway. Sometimes it would be deserted save for small purple
butterflies which fluttered about as if in continuous indecision, and
rarely ascended more than a foot above the ground. But people passed
at intervals--as now a page, who was a notably fine fellow, clothed in
ash-colored gray, with slashed, puffed sleeves, and having a heron's
feather in his cap; or a Franciscan with his gown tucked up so that you
saw how the veins on his naked feet stood out like the carvings on a
vase; or a farmer leading a calf; or a gentleman in a mantle of
squirrel's fur riding beside a wonderful proud lady, whose tiny hat was
embroidered with pearls. It was all very interesting to watch, it was
like turning over the leaves of a book written in an unknown tongue and
guessing what the pictures meant, because these people were intent upon
their private avocations, in which you had no part, and you would never
see them any more.

Then destiny took a hand in the affair and Guido came. He reined his
gray horse at the sight of her sitting by the wayside and deferentially
inquired how far it might be to the nearest inn. Graciosa told him.
He thanked her and rode on. That was all, but the appraising glance of
this sedate and handsome burgher obscurely troubled the girl afterward.

Next day he came again. He was a jewel-merchant, he told her, and he
thought it within the stretch of possibility that my lord Balthazar's
daughter might wish to purchase some of his wares. She viewed them
with admiration, chaffered thriftily, and finally bought a topaz, dug
from Mount Zabarca, Guido assured her, which rendered its wearer immune
to terrors of any kind.

Very often afterward these two met on the outskirts of the forest as
Guido rode between the coast and the hill-country about his vocation.
Sometimes he laughingly offered her a bargain, on other days he paused
to exhibit a notable gem which he had procured for this or that wealthy
amateur. Count Eglamore, the young Duke's favorite yonder at court,
bought most of them, it seemed. "The nobles complain against this
upsta