Deuce--ace again!" Gerard prepared to retire.

The seneschal, with an incredulous smile, replied: "The young man is here by the Countess's orders; be so good as conduct him to her ladies." On this a superb Adonis rose, with an injured look, and led Gerard into a room where sat or lolloped eleven ladies, chattering like magpies.
Two, more industrious than the rest, were playing cat's-cradle with fingers as nimble as their tongues.

At the sight of a stranger all the tongues stopped like one piece of complicated machinery, and all the eyes turned on Gerard, as if the same string that checked the tongues had turned the eyes on.

Gerard was ill at ease before, but this battery of eyes discountenanced him, and down went his eyes on the ground.

Then the cowards finding, like the hare who ran by the pond and the frogs scuttled into the water, that there was a creature they could frighten, giggled and enjoyed their prowess.