She obeyed him, slipping through the tapestry into her own room. Once there, she looked round with a wild wonder. Could this be herself--Hélène de Sainfoy--about to escape into the wide world with her lover--and empty-handed? She looked down vaguely at her white evening gown and thin shoes, snatched up her watch and chain and a diamond ring, which were lying on the table, and slipped them into her pocket. It was the work of a moment, yet when she carried the candle to Angelot, he was white as death, and stamping with impatience; the flame in his eyes frightened her. He took the candle without a word and disappeared down the first steep winding of the stairs. His moving shadow danced gigantic on the wall, then was gone. Hélène waited in the darkness. Even love and faith, with hope added, were not strong enough to keep her brave and happy during the terrible minutes of lonely waiting there. Her limbs trembled, her heart thumped so that she had to lean for support against the cold damp wall. She bent her head forward, eagerly listening. Why had she not gone down with him? Somebody might hear him whistle. However, no whistle came; only a dull sound of banging, which echoed strangely, alarmingly, up the narrow staircase in the thickness of the wall. It seemed to Hélène that she had waited long and was becoming stupefied with anxiety, when a light flashed suddenly upon her eyes, and she opened them wide; she had never lost the childish fear which made her shut them in the dark. Angelot had leaped up the stairs again and was standing beside her, white and frowning. "It is impossible," he said, in a hurried whisper. "I cannot move the bar without tools. Come back into the chapel." He set down the candlestick on the altar step, walked distractedly to the end of the low vaulted room, then back to where she stood gazing at him with a pitiful terror in her eyes. "What is to be done! Is there no other way!" he said, half to himself. "Mon Dieu, Hélène, how beautiful you are! Ah, what is that? Listen!" His ears, quicker than hers, had caught steps and a rustling sound in the passage that ended at the chapel door. "Dear--go back to your room," he said. "They must not find you here. We shall meet again--Good-night, my own!" He was gone. The bewildered girl looked after him silently, and he was across the floor, on the window-sill, disappearing hand over head down his ladder of old twisted ivy stems, before she realised anything. Then, not the least aware that some one was knocking at her bedroom door in the passage, shaking the latch, calling her name, she flew after him to the window and leaned out, crying to him low and wildly, "Angelot, come back, come back! Why did you go? Ah, don't leave me! Help me to climb down, too,--please, please, darling!"