Flonan nodded,—­and took his departure, and the Prince for a moment stood hesitating, looking at the great white covering on the wall which concealed his daughter’s mysterious work.  His tall upright figure stiff and sombre, looked as if cast in bronze in the half light shed by the wood fire,—­one lamp was still burning, and after a pause he moved from his rigid attitude of gloomy consideration, and extinguished it, then glancing round to see that all was in order, he left the studio, closing its great oaken door behind him.  Five minutes after he had gone a soft step trod the polished floor, and the young Manuel, holding a lighted taper, entered all alone.  The flame of the little torch he carried cast a soft golden glow about him as he walked noiselessly through the great empty room, his blue eyes lifted to the marble heads of gods and heroes which occupied their different positions on the gilded and oaken brackets set against the tapestried walls,—­and presently he paused in front of Angela’s hidden work.  It was but a moment’s pause, and then, still with the same light step, and the same bright glow reflected from the flame that glittered in his hand, he passed through the room, lifted the velvet portiere at the other end where there was another door leading to the corridor connected with the Cardinal’s apartments, and so unnoticed, disappeared.

XXIII.

Meanwhile, the Marquis Fontenelle had been nearly a fortnight in Rome, living a sufficiently curious sort of life, and passing his time in a constant endeavour to avoid being discovered and recognised by any of his numerous acquaintances who were arriving there for the winter.  His chief occupation was of course to watch the Comtesse Sylvie,—­and he was rewarded for his untiring pains by constant and bewitching glimpses of her.  Sometimes he would see her driving, wrapped in furs, her tiny Japanese dog curled up in a fold of her sables, and on her lap a knot of violets, the fresh scent of which came to him like a sweet breath on the air as she passed.  Once he almost met her, face to face in the gardens of the Villa Borghese, walking all alone, and reading a book in which she seemed to be deeply interested.  He made a few cautious enquiries about her, and learnt that she lived very quietly,—­that she received certain “great” people,—­especially Cardinals and Monsignori, notably Monsignor Gherardi, who was a constant visitor.  But of any closer admirer he never gathered the slightest rumour, till one afternoon, just when the sun was sinking in full crimson glory behind the dome of St. Peter’s, he saw her carriage come to a sudden halt on the Pincio and she herself leaned out of it to shake hands with, and talk to a tall fair man, who seemed to be on exceptionally friendly terms with her.  It is true she was accompanied in the carriage by the famous Sovrani,—­but that fact did not quell the sudden flame of jealousy which sprang up in Fontenelle’s mind—­for