Here the student paused as if overcome by the recollection of that moment, and passed his hand nervously across his brow.  I took the liberty of pushing our bottle of Chablis towards him, for which he thanked me with a nod and a smile, and filled his glass to the brim.

“Well?” cried two or three voices eagerly; my own being one of them.  “The door opened—­what then?”

“And a lady entered,” he continued.  “A lady dressed in black from head to foot, with a small lamp in her hand.  Seeing me, she laid her finger significantly on her lip, closed the door as cautiously as she had opened it, and, with the faltering, uncertain steps of one just risen from a sick-bed, came over to where I had been sitting, and leaned for support against my chair.  She was very pale, very calm, very young and beautiful, with just that look of passive despair in her face that one sees in Guido’s portrait of Beatrice Cenci.  Standing thus, I observed that she kept her eyes turned from the corpse, and her attention concentrated on the portrait.  So several minutes passed, and neither of us spoke nor stirred.  Then, slowly, shudderingly, she turned, grasped me by the arm, pointed to the dead form stretched upon the table, and less with her breath than by the motion of her lips, shaped out the one word:—­’Murdered!’

“Stunned by this confirmation of my doubts, I could only clasp my hands in mute horror, and stare helplessly from the lady to the corpse, from the corpse to the sleeper.  Wildly, feverishly, with all her calmness turned to eager haste, she then bent over the body, tore open the rich doublet, turned back the shirt, and, without uttering one syllable, pointed to a tiny puncture just above the region of the heart—­a spot so small, so insignificant, such a mere speck upon the marble, that but for the pale violet discoloration which spread round it like a halo, I could scarcely have believed it to be the cause of death.  The wound had evidently bled inwardly, and, being inflicted with some singularly slender weapon, had closed again so completely as to leave an aperture no larger than might have been caused by the prick of a needle.  While I was yet examining it, the fire fell together, and my conductor stirred uneasily in his sleep.  To cover the body hastily with the cloth and resume my seat, was, with me, the instinctive work of a moment; but he was quiet again the next instant, and breathing heavily.  With trembling hands, my visitor next re-closed the shirt and doublet, replaced the outer covering, and bending down till her lips almost touched my ear, whispered:—­

“‘You have seen it.  If called upon to do so, will you swear it?’

“I promised.

“’You will not let yourself be intimidated by threats? nor bribed by gold? nor lured by promises?

“‘Never, so help me Heaven!’

“She looked into my eyes, as if she would read my very soul; then, before I knew what she was about to do, seized my hand, and pressed it to her lip.