Nor had I long to wait.
Presently she appeared, and I could have doubted the testimony of my eyes, so changed were the agonized face and figure of a few moments before.

Beautiful and disdainful, she moved to the table, and took the great chair drawn before it with the air of an empress mounting a throne.

I contented myself with the stool.
She ate nothing, and scarcely touched the canary I poured for her.
I pressed upon her wine and viands,--in vain; I strove to make conversation,--equally in vain.

Finally, tired of "yes" and "no" uttered as though she were reluctantly casting pearls before swine, I desisted, and applied myself to my supper in a silence as sullen as her own.

At last we rose from table, and I went to look to the fastenings of door and windows, and returning found her standing in the centre of the room, her head up and her hands clenched at her sides.