ncreased in numbers. But she
slept again, to waken to full sunlight, greatly refreshed.

When she had breakfasted and dressed, she went out on a balcony, and
looked down at the valley. It was late. Already the peasants of Etzel
had gone out to their fields. Children played along its single streets.
A few women on the steps of the church made rosaries of beads which they
strung with deft fingers. A band of pilgrims struggled up the valley,
the men carrying their coats, for the sun was warm, and the women
holding their skirts from the dust.

As they neared the church, however, coats were donned. The procession
took on order and dignity. The sight was a familiar one to the Countess.
Her eyes dropped to the old wall below, where in the sunshine the
caretaker was beating a rug. Close to him, in intimate and cautious
conversation, was the driver of the night before. Glancing up, they saw
her and at once separated.

Gone was peace, then. The Countess knew knew certainly. "Our eyes see
everywhere." Eyes, indeed, eyes that even now the caretaker raised
furtively from his rug.

Nevertheless, the Countess was minded to experiment, to be certain. For
none is so suspicious, she knew, as one who fears suspicion. None so
guilty as the guilty. During the forenoon she walked through the
woods, going briskly, with vigorous, mountainbred feet. No crackle of
underbrush disturbed her. Swift turnings revealed no lurking figures
skulking behind the trunks of trees. But where an ancient stone bridge
crossed a mountain stream, she came on the huge driver of the night
before reflectively fishing.

He saluted her gravely, and the Countess paused and looked at him. "You
have caught no fish, my friend?" she said.

"No, madame. But one plays about my hook."

She turned back. Eyes everywhere, and arms, great hairy arms. And feet
that, for all their size, must step lightly!

Restlessness followed her. She was a virtual Prisoner, free only in
name. And the vigilance of the Terrorists obsessed her. She found a
day gone, and no plan made. She had come here to think, and consecutive
thought was impossible. She went to vespers at the church, and sat
huddled in a corner. She suspected every eye that turned on her in frank
curiosity. When, during the "Salve Regina," the fathers, followed by
their pupils, went slowly down the aisle, in reverent procession between
rows of Pilgrims, she saw in their habits only a grim reminder of the
black disguises o