Gabrielle had the strength of spirit to control the wonder, the joy, the hope at the sound of the loved voice thus brought her so suddenly; but she trembled, and her strength seemed to fail her. She sank into the chair which the hunchback had offered her. "My God!" she murmured, and then said no more, but sat with clasped hands and rigid face.
The hunchback spoke again, in the same low, measured tones: "Seem to listen against your will. A sign may betray us both."
"Henri!" Gabrielle murmured.
The hunchback went on: "Seem as if you were enchanted at my words, by my gestures. They are watching us."
Now the hunchback walked slowly in a circle round the chair on which Gabrielle was seated, making as he did so fantastic gestures with his hands over her head—gestures which suggested to the amazed spectators some wizard busy with his horrid incantations.
Taranne nudged Oriol. "She listens."
"She seems pleased," Oriol answered.
Chavernay muttered, angrily: "This must be witch-craft."
Nocé, leaning forward a little, called to the hunchback: "How speeds your suit?"
The hunchback paused for a moment in his round to make a motion for silence. "Famously, gentlemen, famously. But you must not disturb my incantations."