Among the decorations of the room, which were not strictly in accordance with genuine Arcadian simplicity, was a large looking-glass, placed over a well-furnished sideboard.  D’Arbino led Fabio in this direction, exchanging greetings as he advanced with a gentleman who stood near the glass looking into it, and carelessly fanning himself with his mask.

“My dear friend!” cried D’Arbino, “you are the very man to lead us straight to the best bottle of wine in the palace.  Count Fabio, let me present to you my intimate and good friend, the Cavaliere Finello, with whose family I know you are well acquainted.  Finello, the count is a little out of spirits, and I have prescribed a good dose of wine.  I see a whole row of bottles at your side, and I leave it to you to apply the remedy.  Glasses there! three glasses, my lovely shepherdess with the black eyes—­the three largest you have got.”

The glasses were brought; the Cavaliere Finello chose a particular bottle, and filled them.  All three gentlemen turned round to the sideboard to use it as a table, and thus necessarily faced the looking-glass.

“Now let us drink the toast of toasts,” said D’Arbino.  “Finello, Count Fabio—­the ladies of Pisa!”

Fabio raised the wine to his lips, and was on the point of drinking it, when he saw reflected in the glass the figure of the Yellow Mask.  The glittering eyes were again fixed on him, and the yellow-hooded head bowed slowly, as if in acknowledgment of the toast he was about to drink.  For the third time the strange chill seized him, and he set down his glass of wine untasted.

“What is the matter?” asked D’Arbino.

“Have you any dislike, count, to that particular wine?” inquired the cavaliere.

“The Yellow Mask!” whispered Fabio.  “The Yellow Mask again!”

They all three turned round directly toward the door.  But it was too late—­the figure had disappeared.

“Does any one know who this Yellow Mask is?” asked Finello.  “One may guess by the walk that the figure is a woman’s.  Perhaps it may be the strange color she has chosen for her dress, or perhaps her stealthy way of moving from room to room; but there is certainly something mysterious and startling about her.”

“Startling enough, as the count would tell you,” said D’Arbino.  “The Yellow Mask has been responsible for his loss of spirits and change of complexion, and now she has prevented him even from drinking his wine.”

“I can’t account for it,” said Fabio, looking round him uneasily; “but this is the third room into which she has followed me—­the third time she has seemed to fix her eyes on me alone.  I suppose my nerves are hardly in a fit state yet for masked balls and adventures; the sight of her seems to chill me.  Who can she be?”

“If she followed me a fourth time,” said Finello, “I should insist on her unmasking.”

“And suppose she refused?” asked his friend