"Monsieur," said a soft but thrilling voice from the doorway, "will you return to me my mask, which I dropped in this room a few moments ago?"
As he raised his head the woman stopped, transfixed.
"Diane?" leaped from the Chevalier's lips. He caught the back of a chair to steady himself. He was mad, he knew he was mad; it had come at last, this loosing of reason.
CHAPTER XIX
A PAGE FROM MYTHOLOGY BY THE WAY AND A LETTER
A man's brain can accept only so many blows or surprises at one time; after that he becomes dazed, incapable of lucid thought. At this moment it seemed to the Chevalier that he was passing through some extravagant dream. The marquis was unreal; yonder was a vapor assuming the form of a woman. He stared patiently, waiting for the dream to dissolve.
He was staring into a beautiful face, lively, yet possessing that unmarred serenity which the Greeks gave to their female statues; but it was warm as living flesh is warm. Every feature expressed nobility in the catholic sense of the word; the proud, delicate nose, the amiable, curving mouth, the firm chin and graceful throat. In the candle-light the skin had that creamy pallor of porcelain held between the eye and the sun. The hair alone would have been a glory even to a Helen. It could be likened to no color other than that russet gold which lines the chestnut bur. The eyes were of that changing amber of woodland pools in autumn; and a soul lurked in them, a brave, merry soul, more given to song and laughter than to tears. The child of Venus had taken up his abode in this woman's heart; for to see her was to love her, and to love her was to despair.
The tableau lasted several seconds. She was first to recover; being a woman, her mind moved swifter.
"Do I wear the shield of Perseus, and is the head of Medusa thereupon? Truly, I have turned Monsieur du Cévennes into stone!"