She sat for a while in the boudoir, thinking that Knight might come soon, before she began to undress. There was a dying glow of coal and logs in the fireplace, but staring into the rosy mass brought no inspiration. She could not concentrate her thoughts on the scene which must presently be enacted; they would go straggling wearily to other scenes already acted, even as far back as that hour at the Savoy when a young man who looked to her like the hero of a novel begged to sit at her table. He still seemed as much as ever like the hero of a novel in which he had splendidly made her the heroine; but it was not a pleasant chapter she had to read now. It reminded her too intensely of the mystery surrounding the hero, and forced her to realize that stories of real life have not always happy endings. "But ours must!" she said to herself, springing up, unable to rest. "Nothing can break our love; and while we have that we have everything!" She could no longer sit still, and going into her bedroom she peeped through the door into Knight's room beyond. It was dark, as she expected to find it; for she had been almost sure that she would have heard him if he had entered the vestibule. Returning to her own rooms, she pulled back the sea-blue curtains which covered the large window looking on to the loggia. The sky was silver-white with moonlight between the black stems of the tall pines, and a flood of radiance poured into the room. It was so beautiful and bright, bringing with it so heavenly a sense of peace, that the girl could not bear to draw the curtains again. She began slowly to undress by moonlight and the faint red glow in the fireplace. Her first act was to recover the blue diamond ring and to drop it with shrinking fingers into the jewel-case on her dressing table. Taking off her dinner frock, she put on a white silk gown which turned her into a pale spirit flitting hither and thither in the silver dusk. Still Knight had not come. She pulled out the four great tortoise-shell pins which held up her hair, and let it tumble over her shoulders. As she began to twist it into one heavy plait, she walked to the window and stood looking out. It seemed to her that the black trunks and outstretched branches of the trees were like prison bars across the moonlight. She wished she had not had that thought, but as it persisted, a figure moved behind the bars, the figure of a man. At first she was startled, for it was very late, long after one o'clock; but as the man came nearer, she recognized him, although the light was at his back. It was Knight; and as though her thought called to him, he stopped suddenly, pausing on the lawn not far from the loggia. She could not see his face, but it seemed that he was staring straight up at her window.