Wondering where he would find Crispin, and whether that gentleman was yet awake, Maurice stole quietly from his room, and, drawing aside the curtains, looked out into the middle court, where he saw a sight which chained him to the earth. Not Paris sitting in judgment on Mount Ida saw such a vision of loveliness as now appeared to the enraptured eyes of Roylands. The picture—ah, that was but a pale reflection of this rich, ripe, glowing beauty! Venus, the goddess of love herself, yet with a touch of the chaste purity of Artemis—not Venus Pandemos, with flushed face and wanton glance, but Venus Urania, chaste, cold, pure, and serene as the moon-huntress herself. The moon, hanging like a great silver sphere in the darkly blue sky, shone serenely through the hypæthral opening of the court, and in her pale light the ranges of white columns glimmered like faint ghosts in the doubtful gloom. Like a silver rod the fountain’s jet shot up to meet her kiss, and the splashed waters of the pool trembled restlessly with faint flashes within the marble marge. The cold, sweet odors of the flowers made the night air drowsy with their perfumes, and a distant nightingale began to trill deliciously in the still beauty of the evening. But the onlooker saw not the moon, the fountain, or the solemn range of pillars; he had no ears for the liquid notes of the unseen bird; for his eyes were fixed in an enamoured gaze on a tall, beautiful woman, who stood with upturned face gazing at the sky. In that tremulous light she looked more than mortal in her spiritual loveliness—some goddess of ancient Hellas once more visiting the dear-loved islands of the Ægean—perchance Aphrodite herself, haunting the fane of her husband Hephaistos. To add to the plausibility of this fantastic idea, this girl was draped in the long white chiton of antique times, and her golden hair, dressed after the fashion of the Venus of Cnidos, was bound with triple bands of silver, while her slender arms, bare to the shoulder, were devoid of any ornament. So fair, so pure, so ethereal she appeared, that Maurice might well be pardoned for deeming her some pale sweet spirit of classic times, haunting the scenes of her former life, and listening, as she had done in the past, to the golden notes of the divine nightingale, thrilling to ecstasy the heart of the dusk. For a few minutes Maurice stood spellbound in the contemplation of this lovely incarnation of Venus Urania, then inadvertently made a movement which made the girl start from her rapt attitude, and look in his direction. Being thus discovered, he came forward to meet the awakened divinity, looking himself, in his sweeping robe, like some young disciple of Plato or Parmenides. To his surprise and delight, this beautiful woman, with a smile on her exquisite face, came forward to meet him half-way with outstretched hands.