"You are the servant of the strange Doctor?" said the voice of the servitor, Sir Respectable.
"That I am, as by this time you may have seen!" answered I, for I was in no mood of mere politeness. I was venturing my life in the house of mine enemy, and, at least, it would be no harm if I put a bold face on the matter.
He opened the door, and again the same curious perfume was wafted down the passages—something that I had never felt either in the Wolfsberg nor yet even in the women's chambers of the Palace of Plassenburg.
At the door of the little room in which she had first received me so long ago, the Lady Ysolinde was waiting for me.
She did not shut the door till Sir Respectable had betaken him down again to his own place. Then quite frankly and undisguisedly she took my hand, like one who had come to the end of make-believe.
"I knew you to-day in your disguise," she said; "it is an excellent one, and might deceive all save a woman who loves. Ah, you start. It might deceive the woman you love, but not the woman that loves you. I am not the Princess to-night; I am Ysolinde, the Woman. I have no restraints, no conventions, no laws, no religions to-night—save the law of a woman's need and the religion of a woman's passion."
I stood before her, scarce knowing what to say.
"Sit down," she said; "it is a long story, and yet I will not weary you,
Hugo—so much I promise you."
I made answer to her, still standing up.
"To-night, my lady, after what you know, you will not be surprised that I can think of only one thing. You know that to-day—"