"Now for your second observation?" said the marquis. "Mademoiselle Bertha, whom I suppose and believe to be a very neat young lady, was, when you did me the honor to present me to her, singularly covered with cobwebs; they were even in her beautiful hair." "Well?" "Well, certain as I was that she had not chosen that style of adornment out of coquetry, I looked about this morning for a part of the château that was well supplied with the toil of those interesting insects, the spiders." "And you discovered--?" "Faith! what I discovered doesn't redound to the honor of your religious sentiments, my dear marquis, or, at any rate, to your practice of them; for it was precisely across the doorway of your chapel that I found a dozen spiders working with unimaginable zeal to repair the damage done last night to their webs,--a zeal no doubt inspired by the belief that the opening of the door where they had fixed their homes was only an accident not likely to occur again." "You must allow, my dear general, that all these indications are somewhat vague." "Yes, but when your hounds turn their noses to the wind and strain at the leash, that is nothing more than a vague indication, is it? And yet on that indication yon beat the woods with care, and very great care, too." "Certainly," said the marquis. "Well, that's my way also. Then, on your paths (where, by the bye, gravel is essentially lacking), I have discovered some very significant tracks." "Steps of men and women?" exclaimed the marquis. "Pooh! they are everywhere." "No, there are not everywhere steps crowded together and going in one direction, according to what I suppose to be the number of actors on the scene,--steps, too, of persons who were not walking, but running together." "But how in the world could you tell that those persons were running?" "Why, marquis, that's the A B C of the business." "Tell me, quick!" "Because their footmarks are more from the toes than the heels, and the earth is pushed backward. Isn't that the way to tell, my dear Master of Wolves?" "Right," said the marquis, with the air of a connoisseur; "quite right. What next?" "Next?" "Yes." "I examined the footprints; there were men's steps of various sizes and shapes, boots, shoes, and hob-nail soles. Then in the midst of all these masculine feet what did I see but the print of a woman's foot, slender and arched, Cinderella's foot,--a foot to put all the Andalusian women to shame from Cordova to Cadiz; and that, too, in spite of the heavy nailed shoes which contained it." "Well, well! skip that." "Skip it! why?" "Because, if you say another word you'll be in love with that delicate foot in a hobnailed shoe."