"Jacqueline! Are you there?"
No sound.
Then the lofty gold and azure clock struck. And when the last of the twelve resounding strokes rang echoing through the sunlit armoury, the mailed figure stirred in its saddle, stretched both stirrups, raised its arms and flexed them.
"You nearly caught me," she said calmly. "I was afraid you'd see my eyes through the helmet slits. Was it your lack of enterprise that saved me—or your prudence?"
"I spoke to you before the hour was up. It seems to me that I have won."
"Not at all. You might just as well have stood in the cellar and howled my name. That isn't discovering me, you know."
"I felt in my heart that you were there," he said, in a low voice.
She laughed. "What a man feels in his heart doesn't count. Do you realise that I'm nearly dead sitting for an hour here? This helmet is abominably hot! How in the world could that poor countess have stood it?"
"Shall I climb up beside you and unlace your helmet?" he asked.