moving elsewhere."

She stood still in the middle of the room; she opened her lips to speak,
shut them again, and ended by saying nothing more than:

"Yes, we talked of it. My mother wishes it. Good-night, Mr. Aycon."

I bade her good-night, and she passed slowly through the door, which I
closed behind her. I turned again to the fire, saying:

"What would the duchess think of that?"

I did not even know what I thought of it myself; of one thing only I felt
sure---that what I had heard of Marie Delhasse was not all that there was
to learn about her.

I was lodged in a large room on the third floor, and when I awoke the
bright sun beamed on the convent where, as I presume, Mme. de Saint-Maclou
lay, and on the great Mount beyond it in the distance. I have never risen
with a more lively sense of unknown possibilities in the day before me.
These two women who had suddenly crossed my path, and their relations to
the pale puffy-cheeked man at the little _château_, might well produce
results more startling than had seemed to be offered even by such a freak
as the original expedition undertaken by Gustave de Berensac and me. And
now Gustave had fallen away and I was left to face the thing alone. For
face it I must. My promise to the duchess bound me: had it not I doubt
whether I should have gone; for my interest was not only in the duchess.

I had my coffee upstairs, and then, putting on my hat, went down for a
stroll. So long as the duke did not come to Avranches, I could show my