was a silence. To Neeland she seemed very young in her black gown.
Perhaps it was that sombre setting and her dark eyes and hair which made
her skin seem so white.

"What proof of my identity do you expect?" she asked in a low voice.

"Only one word, Madame."

She moved a step nearer, bent a trifle toward him. "L'Ombre," she
whispered.

From his pocket he drew his credentials and offered them. Among them was
her own letter to the authorities at Lorient.

After she had examined them she handed them back to him.

"Will you come in, Captain Neeland--or, perhaps we had better seat
ourselves on the bridge--in order to lose no time--because I wish you to
see for yourself----"

She lifted her dark eyes; a tint of embarrassment came into her cheeks:
"It may seem absurd to you; it seems so to me, at times--what I am going
to say to you--concerning L'Ombre----"

She had turned; he followed; and at her grave gesture of invitation, he
seated himself beside her on the coping of mossy stone which ran like a
bench under the parapet of the little bridge.

"Captain Neeland," she said, "I am a Bretonne, but, until recently, I did
not suppose myself to be superstitious.... I really am not--unless--except
for this one matter of L'Ombre.... My English governess drove superstition
out of my head.... Still, living in Finistere--here in this house"--she
flushed again--"I shall have to leave it to you.... I dread ridicule; but
I am sure you are too courteous--... It required some courage for me to
write to Lorient. But, if it might possibly help my country--to risk
ridicule--of course I do not hesitate."

She looked uncertainly at the young man's pleasant, serious face, and, as
though reassured:

"I shall have to tell you a little about myself first--so that you may
understand better."

"Please," he said gravely.

"Then--my father and my only brother died a year ago, in battle.... It
happened in the Argonne.... I am alone. We had maintained only two men
servants here. They went with their classes. One old woman remains." She
looked up with a forced smile. "I need not explain to you that our
circumstances are much straitened. You have only to look about you to see
that ... our poverty is not recent; it always has been so within my
memory--only growing a little worse every year. I believe our misfortunes
began during the Vendee.... But that is of no interest ... except
that--through coincidence, of course--every time a new misfor