Her face was turned toward the visitor, and her eyes examined his face; calmly and with no surprise in them, but not without a look of interest.

Their expression was at once so unusual, so disquieting, and yet so inexplicably attractive as to fascinate the Wanderer's gaze.

He did not remember that he had ever seen a pair of eyes of distinctly different colours, the one of a clear, cold gray, the other of a deep, warm brown, so dark as to seem almost black, and he would not have believed that nature could so far transgress the canons of her own art and yet preserve the appearance of beauty.

For the lady was beautiful, from the diadem of her red gold hair to the proud curve of her fresh young lips; from her broad, pale forehead, prominent and boldly modelled at the angles of the brows, to the strong mouldings of the well-balanced chin, which gave evidence of strength and resolution wherewith to carry out the promise of the high aquiline features and of the wide and sensitive nostrils.
"Madame," said the Wanderer, bending his head courteously and advancing another step, "I can neither frame excuses for having entered your house unbidden, nor hope to obtain indulgence for my intrusion, unless you are willing in the first place to hear my short story.

May I expect so much kindness ?" He paused, and the lady looked at him fixedly and curiously.