The count smiled again.
"Look here, what are you laughing at?" cried Lupin, irritably.
"Nothing . . . nothing. . . . I'm very much interested, that's all. . . ."
Isilda looked at the sheet of paper, when he showed it to her, and turned away her head, with a vacant air.
"No bite!" said the count, satirically.
Lupin wrote the letters "APOON."
Isilda paid no more attention than before.
He did not give up the experiment, but kept on writing the same letters, each time watching the girl's face.
She did not stir, but kept her eyes fixed on the paper with an indifference which nothing seemed to disturb. Then, all at once, she seized the pencil, snatched the last sheet out of Lupin's hands and, as though acting under a sudden inspiration, wrote two "L's" in the middle of a space left open by Lupin.
He felt a thrill.