of the five females of her kind then in Virginia, looked at us with large, rolling eyes. She knew a little Spanish, and I spoke to her in that tongue, bidding her find her mistress and tell her that company waited. When she was gone I placed a jack of ale upon the table, and Rolfe and I sat down to discuss it. Had I been in a mood for laughter, I could have found reason in his puzzled face. There were flowers upon the table, and beside them a litter of small objects, one of which he now took up.

“A white glove,” he said, “perfumed and silver-fringed, and of a size to fit Titania.”

I spread its mate out upon my palm. “A woman’s hand. Too white, too soft, and too small.”

He touched lightly, one by one, the slender fingers of the glove he held.