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"I remember this last story very well myself," said Count Schwarzenberg, with a peculiar smile. "His Electoral Grace was very much shocked by the apparition, and its appearance was supposed to announce years of terrible war, for no one in the Electoral family died. Now tell me, Mrs. Culwin, at what time did the White Lady appear yesterday, and how was she dressed?"
Culwin, and if you learn anything new, share it with me. Perhaps I shall come over to the castle myself to-night." He held out his hand to the old woman, and, as he pressed hers, he let a well-filled purse slip into it. He cut off her expressions of gratitude by a short nod of the head, and waved her toward the door.
But as he looked his expression gradually changed, and for an appreciable space of time he and the image in the glass confronted each other with a glare of slowly gathering hate. Then Culwin let go of Frenham's shoulders, and drew back a step, covering his eyes with his hands ... Frenham, his face still hidden, did not stir.
I saw him once in Hong Kong, years afterward. He was fat and hadn't shaved. I was told he drank. He didn't recognize me." "And the eyes?" I asked, after another pause which Frenham's continued silence made oppressive. Culwin, stroking his chin, blinked at me meditatively through the shadows. "I never saw them after my last talk with Gilbert. Put two and two together if you can.
"Your excellency, I can not say exactly, for I did not see her yesterday. The soldiers however, and watchmen, too, affirm that she was dressed entirely in white, which betokens the death of a person of high rank." "You did not see the White Lady yesterday, then? I think she always passes through your room, Mrs. Culwin?"
But as Culwin advanced toward him, their eyes met in a long look; after which, to my intense surprise, the young man, turning suddenly in his seat, flung his arms across the table, and dropped his face upon them. Culwin, at the unexpected gesture, stopped short, a flush on his face. "Phil what the deuce? Why, have the eyes scared you?
"Almost twenty years ago, if it please your honor. I had just been a year in Berlin. Your honor knows I came here from Venice in the capacity of maid to your lady of blessed memory, and had committed the folly of giving up the countess's good service in order to marry Culwin, the young castellan." "And why do you call that a folly?" asked Count Schwarzenberg, laughing.
He left a decent little note to tell me of his decision, and behaved altogether, in the circumstances, as little like a fool as it's possible for a fool to behave ..." CULWIN paused again, and again Frenham sat motionless, the dusky contour of his young head reflected in the mirror at his back. "And what became of Noyes afterward?"
Frenham laughed too, pulling up his slender height before the chimney-piece as he turned to face his short bristling friend. "Oh," he said, "you'd never be content to share if you met one you really liked." Culwin had dropped back into his armchair, his shock head embedded in its habitual hollow, his little eyes glimmering over a fresh cigar. "Liked liked? Good Lord!" he growled.
There was nothing hectic in Frenham's efflorescence, and his old friend had not laid even a finger-tip on the sacred stupidities. One wanted no better proof of that than the fact that Frenham still reverenced them in Culwin. "There's a side of him you fellows don't see.
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