No answer came, but another sob, and Héloise stretched out her hand to touch what seemed her handmaid's tangled hair. Slowly she moved it, with bated breath, in an agony lest she should feel nothing. But it was flesh and blood indeed, and Penelophon seized the hand that touched her, and covered it with kisses. In a few broken words she told her tale, and Héloise listened and blushed like a culprit who receives the reprimand of some august and stainless court.
"But where have you been?" was all she could think of to say when the tale was done.
"We hid in the town down there away from you," Penelophon answered. "For after we were married he was afraid of the King's anger, and bid me let no one know till he had set Trecenito on the throne again, and then he would be forgiven. But I could not wait. So at dusk I stole up to the castle, and lay in the outhouses till all was still; then I crept up here, where I heard them say you were lodged, for I could not bear to think you were mourning for Trecenito; so I thought to come and put his ring on your finger that you might know he was yours and you were his at last. I would have done it secretly, and then departed; but you awoke, and I could not but tell you all, and hear your voice. For God knows," she continued, breaking down again, "I want comfort. He is kind and good, but it is a terrible thing I have done. I have given myself to buy the happiness of him we both love—you and I. It is done, and I would not have it undone; but, indeed, it is a terrible thing, and hard to bear when I am not near you or him."
"Stay, stay, Penelophon!" cried Mlle de Tricotrin; "I cannot bear to hear you speak like this. You are a saint, an angel, and I am worse than the fiends. You shall always be near me, and make me like yourself. You shall never leave me again. Come now to me; come and lie in my arms, and try to make me like yourself."
As she spoke she clasped the slight grey figure to her breast, and soon the two loves of Kophetua were sleeping peacefully in each other's arms.
CHAPTER XXV. THE CROWN OF KISSES.
"And when the wedding day was come,