And his glance fell thoughtfully from her to the couch. Before the assault he had lain at night upon the straw on the floor, and this unhoped-for immunity from the dampness of the stones or the scampering of occasional rats suggested another starting point for mental inquiry. She smiled, reading the interrogation on his face.
"One of the turnkeys furnished the bed," she remarked, shrewdly. "Do you like it?"
"It is a better couch than I have been accustomed to," he replied, in no wise misled by her response, and surmising that her solicitation had procured him this luxury. "Nevertheless, the night has seemed strangely long."
"It has been long," she returned, moving toward the window. "A week and more."
Surprise, incredulity, were now written upon his features. That such an interval should have elapsed since the evening of the free baron's visit appeared incredible. He could not see her countenance as she spoke; only her figure; the upper portion bright, the lower fading into the deep shadows beneath the aperture in the wall.
"You tell me I have lain here a week?" he asked finally, recalling obscure memories of faintly-seen faces and voices heard as from afar.
"And more," she repeated.
For some moments he remained silent, passing from introspection to a current of thought of which she could know nothing; the means he had taken to thwart the ambitious projects of the king's guest.
"Has Caillette returned?" he continued, with ill-disguised eagerness.
"Caillette?" she answered, lifting her brows at the abruptness of the inquiry. "Has he been away? I had not noticed. I do not know."