“Very well, go then. In the meanwhile I will go and see Stenson, to whom I have not yet had leisure to pay my respects, and who probably does not know I am here. He never comes into these premises—”
“Ah, I beg your pardon, M. Goefle, he does. He came in here only a little while ago. I saw him while you had gone out. There; I forgot to tell you of it. He took me either for the devil or for a ghost, for he was in an awful fright, and made his escape stumbling, and absolutely out of his wits with terror.”
“Pshaw! Really? Is he so much of a coward as that? But I have no right to laugh at him, after imagining that I saw the Gray Lady. He certainly cannot have taken you for her!”
“I don’t know who he took me for—perhaps for the ghost of Baron Adelstan.”
“What? Well, it is possible. There is his portrait, opposite to his wife’s; it is much of your size and figure. Still—in that costume—”
“I had not put it on. I was still in your black clothes.”
“Why, what are you doing now? Masking?”
“No, I only put my mask on my head in case I should have to go as far as to the new chateau to find Puffo.”
“Let me see the mask—it must be very unpleasant.”
“Not at all; it is on a plan of my own; light and supple, all of silk, and lifting upon the head like the visor of a cap that can be put up or down at pleasure. When raised and hidden by my hat, it at least helps to hide my hair, which is so thick that it would attract attention. When it is down—I find it very comfortable, by the way, in this climate—it is in no danger of falling, and I am not annoyed by being constantly obliged to tie and untie a ribbon, which, moreover, is liable to break or become entangled. See what a neat invention it is!”