_Jan_. I have seen brides before, but never so gay a one as this. It is strange and fearful to see her stand here alone, in this lonesome house, all in glistening white, smiling, and the light flashing from her eyes thus. She looks too much like some radiant creature from another world, to be long for this. _Helen_. He will come, why should he not? Netty, fix your eye on that opening in the woods, and if you see but a shadow crossing it, tell me quickly. _Jan_. I can see nothing--nothing at all. Marie sanctissima!--how quiet it is! The shadows are straight here now, Miss Helen. _Helen_. Noon--the very hour has come! Another minute it may be.--Noon, you said, Netty? (_Joining Janette at the window_.) _Jan_. Yes, quite--you can see; and hark, there's the clock. Oh, isn't it lonesome though? See how like the Sunday those houses look, with the doors all closed and the yards and gardens still as midnight. If we could but hear a human voice!--whose, I would not care. _Helen_. How like any other noon-day it comes! The faint breeze plays in those graceful boughs as it did yesterday; that little, yellow butterfly glides on its noiseless way above the grass, as then it did;--just so, the shadows sleep on the grassy road-side there;--yes, Netty, yes, _'tis_ very lonely.--Hear those merry birds! _Jan_. But I would rather hear that signal, Miss Helen, a thousand times, than the best music that ever was played. _Helen_. I shall see him again. That wild hope is wild no longer. To doubt were wilder now. Ay, Fate must cross my way with a bold hand, to snatch that good from me now. And yet,--alas, in the shadowy future it lieth still, and a dark and treacherous realm is that! The joys that blossom on its threshold are not ours--It may be, even now, darkness and silence everlasting lie between us. _Jan_. Hark--Hark! _Helen_. What is it? _Jan_. Hark!--There!--Do you hear nothing? _Helen_. Distant voices? _Jan_. Yes-- _Helen_. I do-- _Jan_. Once before,--'twas when I stood in the door below, I heard something like this; but the breeze just then brought the sound of the fall nearer, and drowned it. There it is!--Nearer. The other window, Miss Helen. _Helen_. From that hill it comes, does it not? _Jan_. Yes--yes, I should think it did. Oh yes. There is a guard left there--I had forgotten that. Mon Dieu! How white your lips are! Are you afraid, Ma'amselle? (_Helen stands gazing silently from the window_.) _Jan_. There is no danger. It must have been those soldiers that we heard,--or the cry of some wild animal roaming through yonder woods--it might have been,--how many strange sounds we hear from them. At another time we should never have thought of it. I think we should have heard that signal though, ere this,--I do, indeed.