tly, after an interval of no more than a few
seconds, during which he pictured the singer listening, he heard her
begin to descend.

Two men may do the same thing from motives as far apart as the poles.
Claude did what Louis would have done. As the foot drew near the
staircase door, treading, less willingly, less lightly, more like that
of Anne with every step, he slid into his closet, and stood. Through the
crack between the hinges of the open door, he would be able to view her
face when she appeared.

A second later she came, and he saw. The light of the song was still in
her eyes, but mingled, as she looked round the room to learn who was
there, with something of exaltation and defiance. Christian maidens
might have worn some such aspect, he thought--but he was in love--as
they passed to the lions. Or Esther, when she went unbidden into the
inner court of the King's House, and before the golden sceptre moved.
Something had happened to her. But what?

She did not see him, and after standing a moment to assure herself that
she was alone, she passed to the hearth. She lifted the lid of the pot,
bent over it, and slowly stirred the broth; then, having covered it
again, she began to chop the dried herbs on the platter. Even in her
manner of doing this, he fancied a change; a something unlike the Anne
he had known, the Anne he had come to love. The face was more animated,
the action quicker, the step lighter, the carriage more free. She began
to sing, and stopped; fell into a reverie, with the knife in her hand,
and the herb half cut; again roused herself to finish her task; finally
having slid the herbs from the platter to the pot, she stood in a second
reverie, with her eyes fixed on the window.

He began to feel the falseness of his position. It was too late to show
himself, and if she discovered him what would she think of him? Would
she believe that in spying upon her he had some evil purpose, some low
motive, such as Louis might have had? His cheek grew hot. And then--he
forgot himself.

Her eyes had left the window and fallen to the window-seat. It was the
thing she did then which drew him out of himself. Moving to the
window--he had to stoop forward to keep her within the range of his
sight--she took from it a glove, held it a moment, regarding it; then
with a tender, yet whimsical laugh, a laugh half happiness, half
ridicule of herself, she kissed it.

It was Claude's glove. And if, with that before his eye