Three or four Eastern, rugs covered the greater part of the polished marble pavement, which here and there reflected the light of the tall wax torches that stood on the table in silver candlesticks, and on each side of the bed upon low stands.  The vault above the tapestried walls was very dark blue, and decorated with gilded stars in relief.  Dolores thought the room gloomy, and almost funereal.  The bed looked like a catafalque, the candles like funeral torches, and the whole place breathed the magnificent discomfort of royalty, and seemed hardly intended for a human habitation.

Dolores barely glanced at it all, as her companion locked the first door and led her on to the next room.  He knew that he had not many minutes to spare, and was anxious that she should be in her hiding-place before his servants came back.  She followed him and went in.  Unlike the bedchamber, the small study was scantily and severely furnished.  It contained only a writing-table, two simple chairs, a straight-backed divan covered with leather, and a large chest of black oak bound with ornamented steel work.  The window was curtained with dark stuff, and two wax candles burned steadily beside the writing-materials that were spread out ready for use.

“This is the room,” Don John said, speaking for the first time since they had entered the apartments.

Dolores let her head fall back, and began to loosen her cloak at her throat without answering him.  He helped her, and laid the long garment upon the divan.  Then he turned and saw her in the full light of the candles, looking at him, and he uttered an exclamation.

“What is it?” she asked almost dreamily.

“You are very beautiful,” he answered in a low voice.  “You are the most beautiful woman I ever saw.”

The merest girl knows the tone of a man whose genuine admiration breaks out unconsciously in plain words, and Dolores was a grown woman.  A faint colour rose in her cheek, and her lips parted to smile, but her eyes were grave and anxious, for the doubt had returned, and would not be thrust away.  She had seen the lady in the cloak and veil during several seconds, and though Dolores, who had been watching the men who passed, had not actually seen her come out of Don John’s apartments, but had been suddenly aware of her as she glided by, it seemed out of the question that she should have come from any other place.  There was neither niche nor embrasure between the door and the corridor, in which the lady could have been hidden, and it was hardly conceivable that she should have been waiting outside for some mysterious purpose, and should not have fled as soon as she heard the two officers coming out, since she evidently wished to escape observation.  On the other hand, Don John had quietly denied that any woman had been there, which meant at all events that he had not seen any one.  It could mean nothing else.