CHAPTER XII.
A GHOSTLY VISITANT.
It was the irony of fate that the mansion which had been assigned as a permanent dwelling-place to the woman condemned to a life of asceticism, had been originally fitted up as a fairy love-palace for a beautiful creature, possessed of an unquenchable thirst for the fleeting joys of this earthly existence.

Over the richly carved mantelpiece in Blanka's sleeping-room was what looked like a splendid bas-relief in marble.

It was in reality no bas-relief at all, but a wonderfully skilful bit of painting, so cleverly imitating the sculptor's chisel that even a closer inspection failed to detect the deception.

It represented a recumbent Sappho playing on a nine-stringed lyre.

The opening in the sounding-board of the instrument appeared to be a veritable hole over which real strings were stretched.
This painting Blanka had before her eyes when she lay down to sleep at night, and it was the first to greet her when she awoke in the morning.
Nor was it simply that she was forced to see it: Sappho seemed able to make her presence known by other means than by addressing the sight alone.