Page:The black tulip (IA 10892334.2209.emory.edu).pdf/147

 the leaves. This small germ has caused me a much greater emotion than the order of His Highness, which turned aside the sword, already raised, at the Buitenhof.”

“You hope, then?” said Rosa, smiling.

“Yes, yes, I hope.”

“And I, in my turn, when shall I plant my bulb?”

“Oh, the first favourable day I will tell you, but whatever you do, let nobody help you, and don’t confide your secret to any one in the world; do you see, a connoisseur, by merely looking at the bulb, would be able to distinguish its value; and so, my dearest, Rosa, be careful in locking up the third sucker which remains to you.”

“It is still wrapped up in the same paper in which you put it, and just as you gave it me. I have laid it at the bottom of my chest under my point lace, which keeps it dry, without pressing upon it. But good night, my poor captive gentleman.”

“How? already?”

“It must be, it must be.”

“Coming so late, and going so soon.”

“My father might grow impatient not seeing me return, and that precious lover might suspect a rival.”

Here she listened uneasily.

“What is it?” asked Van Baerle.

“I thought I heard something.”

“What, then?”

“Something like a step, creaking on the staircase.”

“Surely,” said the prisoner, “that cannot be master Gryphus, he is always heard at a distance.”

“No, it is not my father, I am quite sure, but”

“But?”

“But it might be Mynheer Jacob.”

Rosa rushed towards the staircase, and a door was