Presently she got up and went out on to the broad balcony which, encroaching upon the size of the rooms, was yet the chief charm of this little home under the roof. She had hung one corner of it with curtains, and George had contrived a canvas awning under which, when the weather was fine, she spent most of the hours of his absence. Her husband watched without following her as she leaned upon the rail and looked out at the yellow glow in the west which could still be seen behind the housetops. Suddenly she turned and came back to him. Standing just within the window with her back to the fading light, her face could not be seen; but her voice rang out with a strange vibration as she called to him, holding her arms towards him: “George, why don’t you come out to me?” He was with her in a moment, found her trembling and dry-lipped, and tried to persuade her to lie down while he called to the old woman from whom they rented the rooms, to prepare their supper. But Nouna shook her head, and insisted on his remaining with her by the window. Yes, she was tired, she admitted, but she wanted the air; she would go out on the balcony again if he would go with her. As she seemed to desire it, he let her lead him out, all the time keeping her eyes fixed in a remarkable manner immovably on his face. “Look out,” she said, “at the sky--at the houses--at all you can see.” He let his gaze pass obediently from her face to the pale-starred sky, the grey-blue of which was merging into the last red rays of the disappearing sunset: to the house-roofs and chimney-pots, of which they had a good though not an extensive view, to the street below, with its little globes of yellow light, and the dark specks which were all he could see of the moving passengers. Then he turned to her curiously. “Well, little one, I have looked at everything.” “And you see nothing--nothing strange at all?” “There’s a tabby cat two roofs off,” said the prosaic male doubtfully. “No, no,” she interrupted impatiently, still without moving her eyes from his face. “Down below us--on the opposite side--a little to the left--in the black shade.” Her voice had sunk gradually into a whisper. Then she stopped. “Well, I see nothing.” “Not at the house where they have a floor shut up?” George stepped forward and leaned over the rail of the balcony as she had done, Nouna following closely and clinging to his hand. On the opposite side, about three doors down, there was a flat on the third floor which had borne during the first days of their residence in Paris a large board inscribed ‘_A louer_.’ George saw that the board was gone, and that one of the shutters was thrown back. “Oh, I see they’ve let it. Well, there’s nothing to be frightened about in that, my child.” “You don’t notice anything else--anything strange--you don’t see any--person?” George started, and looked down again with searching eagerness along the line of dead-eyed shuttered windows. “No, child, there is nobody.”