To Alan’s secret amusement he perceived that she thought her life very ordinary and natural, while his own adventures on the moorland farm of his boyhood were to her like fairy-tales.  She was shyly but intensely curious about his mother.  She had never known anything of the ways of mothers except from books and tales.

One bright morning she took from a coffer a prism of rock-crystal.  “This is one of the playthings my father gave me,” she said.  “Look how it makes the colors dance upon the wall.”

Like a quick silent fairy the little rainbow flitted here and there.  “He told me,” she went on, “that seven invisible colors live together in a sunbeam, but when they pass this magic door they must go in single file, and then we may see them.  Not all are good colors.  Some are bad and quarrelsome, and some are good when they are alone, but not when they are with colors they do not like.  But when they live together in peace they make the beautiful clear daylight, and we see the world exactly as it is.”

“As it is—­saints protect her,” muttered old Maddalena, and the jester smiled his twisted smile.

That evening Stefano said suddenly, “What are you going to do with your clerk?”

“To-morrow,” said Alan, “I shall go to his mine.”

“You have not been there?”

“No; he has made some silly excuse each time it has been suggested.”

“He will never take you there,” said the jester.  “You will see.”

“Simon,” said Alan pleasantly that night, “I am going into the mountains with you to-morrow.”

Suspicion, fear, jealous greed, chased one another over the clerk’s mean face.  “You are in great haste,” he muttered.  “It is not good weather, but we will go of course, if you wish.”

In the morning Simon lay groaning with rheumatism, unable to move.  Alan made a fire, covered him warmly, left food within his reach, and went out to think the matter over.  Unconsciously his steps tended toward the house of the jester.  Stefano, coming out, caught sight of him.

“Hey!” said the fool, “why are you not in the mountains?”

Alan explained.  The other gave a dry little laugh.  “That need not hinder you,” said he.  “I will send some one to show you the place.  Come to the market-square an hour hence and look for a youth with two horses.  I think you would pass for a wood-cutter if you had an ax.”

Acting on this hint, Alan provided himself with ax and maul, and found in the place appointed a serving boy riding one horse and leading another.  He had reason to be glad of the rough life of his boyhood, for he had ridden all over the moors, bareback, on just such wiry half-broken animals, and the road they now took was not an easy one.

At last they left the horses in a dell at the foot of the ledges and scrambled up to a small stone building near the top of the mountain, half hidden among evergreens.  Its door was gone and its roof half fallen in, but in it could be seen a stone altar and various tools and utensils, wood cut and ready for burning.  Evidently some one had been using the place—­in fact, some one was here now.  As Alan stood in the doorway a figure rose from a pile of leaves in the corner.