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 would say anything and everything that Messire Noel wished to have said. The scheme had appealed to Noel, and this very evening he expected Huguette to bring the astrologer to him, to which end he had entrusted her with a password which would admit strangers into the royal garden.

As he mused, a figure in a pilgrim's gown came cautiously out of the shadows into the moonlight behind him and stood for a moment watching him. The god Pan could see the face that smiled under the pilgrim's hood—a girl's face, with bright eyes framed in golden hair, but when the girl saw Noel, she slipped a mask over her face, drew her pilgrim's gown closely about her slim body, and lightly across the grass to touch Noel on the shoulder.

Noel turned with a start, and faced, as he believed, a masquerading palmer.

"May I vend you a benevolence, gentleman?" Huguette asked, disguising her voice in an unfamiliar gruffness.

Noel waved aside importunacy.

"Pass your ways, pilgrim. I am in no mood for motley."

He turned away, but the persistent pilgrim followed him.