In the upper story all was still now.  She and Dolores had known where Don John was to be lodged in the palace nearly a month before he had returned, and they had been there more than once, when no one was on the terrace, and Dolores had made her touch the door and the six windows, three on each side of it.  She could get there without difficulty, provided that no one stopped her.

She went a little way in the right direction and then hesitated.  There was more danger to Dolores than to herself if she should be recognized, and, after all, if Dolores was near Don John she was safer than she could be anywhere else.  Inez could not help her very much in any way if she found her there, and it would be hard to find her if she had met Mendoza at first and if he had placed her in the keeping of a third person.  She imagined what his astonishment would have been had he found the real Dolores in her court dress a few moments after Inez had been delivered over to the Princess disguised in Dolores’ clothes, and she almost smiled.  But then a great loneliness and a sense of helplessness came over her, and she turned back and went out upon the deserted terrace again and sat down upon the old stone seat, listening for the screech owl and the fluttering of the bats that flew aimlessly in and out, attracted by the light and then scared away by it again because the moon was at the full.

Inez had never before then wandered about the palace at night, and though darkness and daylight were one to her, there was something in the air that frightened her, and made her feel how really helpless she was in spite of her almost superhuman hearing and her wonderful sense of touch.  It was very still—­it was never so still by day.  It seemed as if people must be lying in wait for her, holding their breath lest she should hear even that.  She had never felt blind before; she had never so completely realized the difference between her life and the lives of others.  By day, she could wander where she pleased on the upper story—­it was cheerful, familiar; now and then some one passed and perhaps spoke to her kindly, as every one did who knew her; and then there was the warm sunlight at the windows, and the cool breath of the living day in the corridors.  The sounds guided her, the sun warmed her, the air fanned her, the voices of the people made her feel that she was one of them.  But now, the place was like an empty church, full of tombs and silent as the dead that lay there.  She felt horribly lonely, and cold, and miserable, and she would have given anything to be in bed in her own room.  She could not go there.  Eudaldo would not understand her return, after being told that she was to stay with the Princess, and she would be obliged to give him some explanation.  Then her voice would betray her, and there would be terrible trouble.  If only she had kept her own cloak to cover Dolores’ frock, she could have gone back and the servant would have thought it quite