CHAPTER X.
"I KNOW YOU FOR A MAN" Entering her cell, the Prioress saw at once that her orders had been obeyed.
The hooded figure stood on the far side of the chamber, leaning broad shoulders against the wall.

Under the cape, the arms were folded; she could see that the feet were crossed beneath the robe.

The dress was indeed the dress of a White Lady, but the form within it was so obviously that of a man--a big man, at bay, and inclined to be defiant--that, despite the strange situation, despite her anger, and her fears, the contrast between the holy habit and its hidden wearer, forced from the Prioress an unwilling smile.
Closing the door, she drew forward a chair of dark Spanish wood, the gift of the Lord Bishop; a chair which well betokened the dignity of her high office.
Seating herself, she laid her left hand lightly upon the mane of one of the carved lions which formed, on either side, the arms of the chair; but her right hand still gripped unseen the ivory hilt; while leaning slightly forward, with feet firmly planted, she was ready at any moment to spring erect.
"I know you for a man," she said.
The thunder rumbled far away in the distance.
The rain still splashed against the casement, but the storm had spent itself; the sky was brightening.

A pale slant of sunshine broke through the parting clouds and, entering the casement, gleamed on the jewelled cross at the breast of the Prioress, and kindled into peculiar radiance the searching light of her clear eyes.
"I know you for a man," she said again.

"You stand there, revealed; and surely you stand there, shamed.