bring back to her!

A faint noise behind as of a sign creaking in the wind, roused me
from this most painful reverie. I turned round, not quickly or
in surprise or fear. Rather in the same dull wonder. The upper
part of the bookseller's door was ajar. It was that I had heard
opened. An old woman was peering out at us.

As our eyes met, she made a slight movement to close the door
again. But I did not stir, and seeming to be reassured by a
second glance, she nodded to me in a stealthy fashion. I drew a
step nearer, listlessly. "Pst! Pst!" she whispered. Her
wrinkled old face, which was like a Normandy apple long kept, was
soft with pity as she looked at Croisette. "Pst!"

"Well!" I said, mechanically.

"Is he taken?" she muttered.

"Who taken?" I asked stupidly.

She nodded towards the forsaken house, and answered, "The young
lord who lodged there? Ah! sirs," she continued, "he looked gay
and handsome, if you'll believe me, as he came from the king's
court yester even! As bonny a sight in his satin coat, and his
ribbons, as my eyes ever saw! And to think that they should be
hunting him like a rat to-day!"

The woman's words were few and simple. But what a change they
made in my world! How my heart awoke from its stupor, and leapt