to follow his lead, and go about open-eyed, seeing all he
would show, and loving him with honest admiration and pride in him. But
it was curious to see how from this moment we changed; and now it was I
who led, and was the master. The master in my own house, I thought for a
moment, as we sat on the shelf under the great round window, and looked
out over the lands that had once belonged to my people. Here once more
the dream came upon me, and I had a wild vision of myself coming back
after years, rich and famous, and buying back the old tower, building
the castle, and holding that sweet princess by my side. The poet
Coleridge, my dear, in describing a man whose wits are crazed, makes use
of this remarkable expression:

"How there looked him in the face
An angel beautiful and bright,
And how he knew it was a fiend,
That miserable knight."

This knowledge was also mercifully mine. And I was helped, too, by a
thing slight enough, and yet curious. Being in distress of mind, I
sought some use of my hands, as is the case with most women and some
men. I fell to pulling off the dead leaves of ivy from the wall; and so,
running my hand along the inside of the window, felt beneath it a
carving on the stone. I lifted the leaves, which here were not so thick
as in most places, and saw a shield carved with arms, and on it the
motto I knew well: "_D'Arthenay, tenez foi!_"

I told my friend that I must be gone that night; that I knew his aunt
desired it, and was entirely in her right, it being most unfitting that
a stranger should be present on such an occasion as this. Doubtless
other friends would be coming, too, and my room would be wanted.

Here he broke out in a storm, and vowed no one should have my room, and
I should not stir a foot for a hundred of them. And here had she kept
him in the dark, as if he were a babe, instead of the head of the house.
It was an affront never to be forgiven. If the vicomte had not been the
friend of his father, he would break off the match, and forbid him the
house. As it was, he was powerless, tied hand and foot.

I interrupted him, thinking such talk idle; and begged to know what
manner of man this was who was coming. Was he--was he the man he should
be?

He was a gallant gentleman, Yvon confessed; there was no fault to find
with him, save that he was old enough to be the girl's father. But that
was all one! If he were twenty viscounts, he shou