The curtains of the bed were looped back to let the air pass freely over her. Lying on her left side, with her face turned away from the table, she could see the arm-chair by the dim night-light. It had a chintz covering--representing large bunches of roses scattered over a pale green ground. She tried to weary herself into drowsiness by counting over and over again the bunches of roses that were visible from her point of view.
Twice her attention was distracted from the counting, by sounds outside--by the clock chiming the half-hour past twelve; and then again, by the fall of a pair of boots on the upper floor, thrown out to be cleaned, with that barbarous disregard of the comfort of others which is observable in humanity when it inhabits an hotel.
In the silence that followed these passing disturbances, Agnes went on counting the roses on the arm-chair, more and more slowly. Before long, she confused herself in the figures--tried to begin counting again--thought she would wait a little first--felt her eyelids drooping, and her head reclining lower and lower on the pillow--sighed faintly--and sank into sleep.
How long that first sleep lasted, she never knew. She could only remember, in the after-time, that she woke instantly.
Every faculty and perception in her passed the boundary line between insensibility and consciousness, so to speak, at a leap.
Without knowing why, she sat up suddenly in the bed, listening for she knew not what. Her head was in a whirl; her heart beat furiously, without any assignable cause. But one trivial event had happened during the interval while she had been asleep.
The night-light had gone out; and the room, as a matter of course, was in total darkness.
She felt for the match-box, and paused after finding it.
A vague sense of confusion was still in her mind. She was in no hurry to light the match. The pause in the darkness was, for the moment, agreeable to her.
In the quieter flow of her thoughts during this interval, she could ask herself the natural question:--What cause had awakened her so suddenly, and had so strangely shaken her nerves?
Had it been the influence of a dream? She had not dreamed at all--or, to speak more correctly, she had no waking remembrance of having dreamed. The mystery was beyond her fathoming: the darkness began to oppress her. She struck the match on the box, and lit her candle.
As the welcome light diffused itself over the room, she turned from the table and looked towards the other side of the bed.
In the moment when she turned, the chill of a sudden terror gripped her round the heart, as with the clasp of an icy hand.
She was not alone in her room!
There--in the chair at the bedside--there, suddenly revealed under the flow of light from the candle, was the figure of a woman, reclining.
Her head lay back over the chair. Her face, turned up to the ceiling, had the eyes closed, as if she was wrapped in a deep sleep.
The shock of the discovery held Agnes speechless and helpless.
Her first conscious action, when she was in some degree mistress of herself again, was to lean over the bed, and to look closer at the woman who had so incomprehensibly stolen into her room in the dead of night.
One glance was enough: she started back with a cry of amazement.
The person in the chair was no other than the widow of the dead Montbarry--the woman who had warned her that they were to meet again, and that the place might be Venice!
Her courage returned to her, stung into action by the natural sense of indignation which the presence of the Countess provoked.
'Wake up!' she called out. 'How dare you come here? How did you get in?
Leave the room--or I will call for help!'
She raised her voice at the last words. It produced no effect.
