"Do you need to ask, Yoletta? Ah, it would have made me so happy if I
could have won your mother's affection! If she only knew how much I wish
for it, and how much I sympathize with her! But she will never like me,
and all I wished to say to her must be left unsaid."

"No, not so," she said. "Come with me to her now: if you feel like that,
she will be kind to you--how should it be otherwise?"

I greatly feared that she advised me to take an imprudent step; but she
was my guide, my teacher and friend in the house, and I resolved to do
as she wished. There were no lights in the long gallery when we entered
it again, only the white moonbeams coming through the tall windows here
and there lit up a column or a group of statues, which threw long, black
shadows on floor and Wall, giving the chamber a weird appearance. Once
more, when I reached the middle of the room, I paused, for there before
me, ever bending forward, sat that wonderful woman of stone, the
moonlight streaming full on her pale, wistful face and silvery hair.

"Tell me, Yoletta, who is this?" I whispered. "Is it a statue of some
one who lived in this house?"

"Yes; you can read about her in the history of the house, and in this
inscription on the stone. She was a mother, and her name was Isarte."

"But why has she that strange, haunting expression on her face? Was she
unhappy?"

"Oh, can you not see that she was unhappy! She endured many sorrows, and
the crowning calamity of her life was the loss of seven loved sons. They
were away in the mountains together, and did not return when expected: