e or four soldiers, who were
coming up with him.

The door opened. Gryphus entered, led his men in, and shut the door
after them.

"There, now search!"

They searched not only the pockets of Cornelius, but even his person;
yet they found nothing.

They then searched the sheets, the mattress, and the straw mattress of
his bed; and again they found nothing.

Now, Cornelius rejoiced that he had not taken the third sucker under his
own care. Gryphus would have been sure to ferret it out in the search,
and would then have treated it as he did the first.

And certainly never did prisoner look with greater complacency at a
search made in his cell than Cornelius.

Gryphus retired with the pencil and the two or three leaves of white
paper which Rosa had given to Van Baerle, this was the only trophy
brought back from the expedition.

At six Gryphus came back again, but alone; Cornelius tried to propitiate
him, but Gryphus growled, showed a large tooth like a tusk, which he had
in the corner of his mouth, and went out backwards, like a man who is
afraid of being attacked from behind.

Cornelius burst out laughing, to which Gryphus answered through the
grating,--

"Let him laugh that wins."

The winner that day was Cornelius; Rosa came at nine.

She was without a lantern. She needed no longer a light, as she could
now read. Moreover, the light might betray her, as Jacob was dogging
her steps more than ever. And lastly, the light would have shown her
blushes.

Of what did the young people speak that evening? Of those matters of
which lovers speak at the house doors in France, or from a balcony into
the street in Spain, or down from a terrace into a garden in the East.

They spoke of those things which give wings to the hours; they spoke of
everything except the black tulip.

At last, when the clock struck ten, they parted as usual.

Cornelius was happy, as thoroughly happy as a tulip-fancier would be to
whom one has not spoken of his tulip.

He found Rosa pretty, good, graceful, and charming.

But why did Rosa object to the tulip being spoken of?

This was indeed a great defect in Rosa.

Cornelius confessed to himself, sighing, that woman was not perfect.

Part of the night he thought of this imperfection; that is to say, so
long as he was awake he thought of Rosa.

After having fallen asleep, he dreamed of her.

But the Rosa of his dreams was by far more perfect than the Rosa of real
life. Not only di