That strange colloquy consisted, on one side, of taunts, and accusations, and menaces. On the other, of a few deprecating words--a sigh or two--and something like a suppressed sob--and lastly, of an assurance, uttered with a trembling voice, that the speaker "never had harboured the slightest thought of betraying the secret she was privy to, or entertained any hope less humble than to be permitted to stay unnoticed and unremembered in her own home"----where she "would be equally uncared for," was probably her heart's muttered conclusion, for the word _home_ trembled on her tongue, and she burst into an agony of tears. Neither the gentle appeal, nor the gush of distressful feeling in which it terminated, seemed to touch the heartless person it was addressed to, for there was no softening in the voice with which, as she quitted the pavilion, she issued her commands, that on her return some half-hour hence, "the letter should be finished, and not more stupidly than usual, or it would be _à refaire_." And so departed the imperious task-mistress, and as her steps died away, and the angry rustling of her robes, the tinkling of the little fountain was again heard chiming with the stock-doves' murmurs, and within the temple all was profoundly still, except at intervals a smothered sob, and then a deep and heart-relieving sigh, the last audible token of subsiding passion. And Walter was still rooted, spell-bound--immovable in the same spot. Lost in a confusion of thoughts, that left him scarcely conscious of his own identity, of the reality of the scene around him, or of the strange circumstances in which he found himself so suddenly involved--more than a few moments it required to restore to him the power of clear perception and comprehension, but not one, when that was regained, to decide on the course he should pursue.