"You will be suspected,—most likely imprisoned. You are an outcast."
"That may be."
"You will be driven to public charity."
"Not till I need a public grave."
"You will have never a glance of pity, never a look of softness, from your northern god; he has no love for you, and he is in his grave most likely. Icarus falls—always."
For the first time she quailed as though struck by a sharp blow; but her voice remained inflexible and serene.
"I can live without love or pity, as I can without home or gold. Once for all,—let me go."
"I will let you go," he said, slowly, as he moved a little away. "I will let you go in seven days' time. For seven days you shall do as you please; eat, drink, be clothed, be housed, be feasted, be served, be beguiled,—as the rich are. You shall taste all these things that gold gives, and which you, being ignorant, dare rashly deride and refuse. If, when seven days end, you still choose, you shall go, and as poor as you came. But you will not choose, for you are a woman, Folle-Farine!"
Ere she knew his intent he had moved the panel and drawn it behind him, and left her alone,—shut in a trap like the birds that Claudis Flamma had netted in his orchards.
That night, when the night without was quite dark, she knelt down before the study of the poppies, and kissed it softly, and prayed to the unknown God, of whom none had taught her in anywise, yet whose light she still had found, and followed in a dim, wondering, imperfect fashion, as a little child lost in the twilight of some pathless wood, pursues in trembling the gleam of some great, still planet looming far above her through the leaves.