About her waist there was a girdle of hammered gold,
and pearls were sewn upon the back of her brown velvet gloves.
One glance of her deep blue eyes she gave me as she approached; then she
lowered them instantly, and so weak--so full of worldly vanities was I
still that in that moment I took shame at the thought that she should see
me thus, in this rough hermit's habit, my face a tangle of unshorn beard,
my hair long and unkempt. And the shame of it dyed my gaunt cheeks. And
then I turned pale again, for it seemed to me that out of nowhere a voice
had asked me:
"Do you still marvel that the image will not bleed?"
So sharp and clear did those words arise from the lips of Conscience that
it seemed to me as if they had been uttered aloud, and I looked almost in
alarm to see if any other had overheard them.
The cavalier was standing before me, and his brows were knit, a deep
amazement in his eyes. Thus awhile in utter silence. Then quite suddenly,
his voice a ringing challenge:
"What is your name?" he said.
"My name?" quoth I, astonished by such a question, and remarking now the
intentness and surprise of his own glance. "It is Sebastian," I answered,
and truthfully, for that was the name of my adoption, the name I had taken
when I entered upon my hermitage.
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