Page:Margaret sherwood--The Princess Pourquoi.djvu/88

 closely locked in his room. Behind great iron bolts he sat upon a three-legged stool, and worked with the colored, rattling bags.

"’T is well that men have devised this thing," he said, holding a mirror before his face, as he sucked air from the bag of rose; "else could I not see if all goes well." And his heart was well-nigh bursting with joy when he saw that the breath of his mouth was even as the breath of the Necromancer upon the air. Then he slipped downstairs and begged for a cup of ale, and as the maid served him in the kitchen, he blew out a whiff from the bag of gold, and of a sudden her face became as the faces of the women who stood in the market-place under the spell of the juggler, and Hugh was glad.

The next day he hid the bags in a