hes are
awfully fine; you don't see 'em in Egypt. But I suppose that's the
type of something too. Types always floor me, don't you know?'

'But the scene is no longer Egypt, my lord; it is Corinth,' replied
Wilderspin.

During this dialogue I stood motionless before the predella: I could
not stir; my feet seemed fixed in the floor by what can only be
described as a wild passion of expectation. As I stood there a
marvellous change appeared to be coming over the veiled figure of the
predella. The veil seemed to be growing more and more filmy--more and
more like the 'steam' to which Sleaford had compared it, till at last
it resolved itself into a veil of mist--into the rainbow-tinted
vapours of a gorgeous mountain sunrise--and looking straight at me
were two blue eyes sparkling with childish happiness and childish
greeting, through flushed mists across a pool on Snowdon.

That she was found at last my heart knew, though my brain was dazed.
That in the next room, within a few yards of me, my mother and
Sleaford and Wilderspin were looking at the picture of Winifred's
face unclouded by the veil, my heart knew as clearly as though my
eyes were gazing at it, and yet I could not stir. Yes, I knew that
she was now neither a beggar in the street, nor a prisoner in one of
the dens of London, nor starving in a squalid garret, but was safe
under the sheltering protection of a good man. I knew that I had only
to pass between those folding-doors to see her in Wilderspin's
picture--see her dressed in the 'azure-coloured tunic bordered with
stars,' and the upper garment of the 'colour of the moon at
moonrise,' which Wilderspin had so vividly described in Wales; and
yet, paralysed by expectation, I could not stir.

III

Soon I was conscious that my mother, Sleaford, and Wilderspin were
standing by my side, that Wilderspin's hand was laid on my arm, and
that I was pointing at the predella--pointing and muttering,

'She lives! She is saved.'

My mother led me into the other studio, and I stood before the great
picture. Wilderspin and Sleaford, feeling that something had occurred
of a private and delicate nature, lingered out of hearing in the
smaller studio.

'I must be taken to her at once,' I muttered to my mother; 'at once.'

So living was the portrait of Winifred that I felt that she must be
close at hand. I looked round to see if she herself were not standing
by me dressed in the dazzling draperies gleaming from Wildersp