“Madame, is Angelique here, with you?”
Eleanore looked at her blankly. “Laure?—Laure is with you. Laure is—What sayest thou, woman?”
Sœur Celeste resignedly bent her head. For some seconds nothing was said. Alixe, her face grown ashen, her body changed to ice, rose, and moved to the side of madame. Then she asked softly, “What hath happened, good sister?”
“Angelique—Laure—the demoiselle—is not in the convent. We have searched for her everywhere. Her veil and wimple were found in her cell upon the bed. Beyond this there is no trace of her. This morning she came not to the church for prime, and we thought she had overslept. She hath so much fasted and prayed of late that Reverend Mother granted indulgence, and bade us let her rest. At breaking of the fast Sœur Eloise was despatched to her cell, and returned with word that she was not there. Since that hour even the daily services have been suspended, while we sought for her. In the garden we found footprints,—those of a woman, and of a man. Perchance they were hers—yet—”
“It is a lie! That is a lie!” burst from Eleanore’s white lips. “Woman, woman, unsay thy words! No man hath ever seen her,—my Laure!”
“I said it not, Madame Eleanore; I but said mayhap,” ventured the gentle sister, timidly. But Eleanore did not hear her. White, rigid, her every muscle drawn tense, she stood there staring before her into space; while Alixe, feeling this scene to be too intimate even for her presence, glided slowly from the room.
Immediately outside the closed door stood David the dwarf, moving restlessly from one spot to another, biting his thick lips, and working his heavy black brows with great nervousness. Seeing Alixe, he seized upon her at once.
“I know what it is: Laure hath gone away, hath she not?”
Alixe simply nodded.
“Yea, I know it,—with that scoundrelly trouvère!”