“The dancer, my Mother, is very sad. She sits with her head on her hands. She looks into the emptiness. It is frightful to watch. I have tried to make her pray, my Mother, but the poor girl does not know how; she has no belief. She refuses even to confess herself. She is pagan--but quite pagan. What could one do for her, my Mother--to cheer her a little during these hours? I have tried to make her tell me of her life. She does not answer. She sits and looks always into the emptiness. It does me harm in the heart to see her. Is there nothing one can do to comfort her a little before she dies? To die so young--so full of life; for her who has no faith! To be shot--so young, so beautiful; but it is frightful, my Mother!” The little elderly Sister raised her hands and crossed them on her grey-clothed breast. Her eyes, brown and mild, looked up, questioning the face before her, wax-pale under its coif and smooth grey hair. Straight, thin, as it were bodiless, beneath her grey and white garb, the Mother Superior stood pondering. The spy-woman in her charge, a dancer with gipsy blood they said--or was it Moorish?--who had wormed secrets from her French naval lover and sold them to the Germans in Spain. At the trial they said there was no doubt. And they had brought her to the convent saying: “Keep her for us till the fifteenth. She will be better with you than in prison.” To be shot--a woman! It made one shiver! And yet--it was war! It was for France! And, looking down at the little elderly Sister, the Mother Superior answered: “One must see, my daughter. Take me to her cell.” They went in gently. The dancer was sitting on her bed. There was no colour in her skin save the saffron sprinkled into it by eastern blood. The face was oval, the eyebrows slanted a little up; black hair formed on her forehead a V reversed; her lips, sensuous but fine, showed a gleam of teeth. Her arms were crossed as though compressing the fire within her supple body. Her eyes, colour of Malaga wine, looked through and beyond the whitened walls, through and beyond her visitors, like the eyes of a caged leopard. The Mother Superior spoke: “What can we do for you, my daughter?” The dancer shrugged. “You suffer, my daughter. They tell me you do not pray. It is a pity.” The dancer’s passing smile had the sweetness of something tasted, of a rich tune, a long kiss; she shook her head. “One would not say anything to trouble you, my daughter; one feels pity for your suffering. One comprehends. Is there a book you would read; some wine you would like; in a word, anything which could distract you a little?” The dancer clasped her hands behind her neck. The movement was beautiful, sinuous--all her body beautiful. A faint colour came into the Mother Superior’s waxen cheeks. “Would you wish to dance for us, my daughter?” On the dancer’s face the smile came again and did not pass. “Willingly. It will give me pleasure, madame!”