blue eyes. What those few faint lines on
her countenance might mean she does not choose you shall interpret;
therefore attempt it not. But when you look at Sybella, it is sorrow you
see; and she says as plainly as if you heard her voice,--

"I have come to the great state where I expect nothing and am content."

Yet _content_! _Is_ it content you read in her face, in her smile? Is it
satisfaction that can gaze out thus upon the world?

It is sorrow rather,--and sorrow, with a questioning thereat, that seems
prophetic of an answer that shall yet overthrow all the grim deductions,
and restore the early imaginings, pure hopes, desires, and loving aims.

You will choose to gaze rather after this shadowy vision of the fair,
golden hair that lies tranquilly on the high and beautiful forehead; the
face, pale as pallor itself, which seems to have no color, except in
eyes and lips: the eyes so large and blue; the lips with their story of
firm courage and true genius, so grand in calm. A figure, however, not
likely to attract the many, but whom it held for once it held forever.

So the organist came to the room of Adam von Gelhorn.

She knew his working hours and habits, it seemed; at least, she did not
fail to find him, and at work.

As she stepped forward into the apartment, before whose door she had
paused a moment, no trace of embarrassment or of irresolution was to be
seen in face, eye, or movement.

But the artist, who arose from his work, _was_ taken by surprise.

The armor of the world did not suffice to protect him at this moment. He
was at the mercy of the woman who was here.

"Mrs. Edgar!"

"Adam."

"Here!"

"To thank you for the flowers, and to warn you that setting them in
deserts is neither safe nor providential."

And now her eyes ran round the room,--a flash in which was sheathed a
smile of satisfaction and of friendly pride. She had come here full of
reproaches, but surely there was some enchantment against her.

"You will order a picture, perhaps?" said the artist, restored to at
least an appearance of ease.

But his eyes did not follow hers. They stopped with her: with some
misgiving, some doubt, some perplexity, for he knew not perfectly the
ground on which he stood.

"You have been twice to see me, and both times have missed me," she
said. "I was sorry for that. I did not know until then that you were
living here."

"But what does it mean, that nobody in H---- has heard the voice yet? I