Her eyes were shut, her attitude relaxed.

But so soon as ever her master moved even an inch to consult a marked list of dates which hung on a hook beside him, or leaned over to dip a quill in his scarlet ink, the flashing yellow eye and the gleam of white teeth underneath told that Astarte was awake and intently watching every movement of the worker.
Through the heavy boom of the storm without, the thresh of the rain upon the lattice casement, and the irregular whipping gusts which shook the house, the soft wheeze of the engrossing quill could be heard, the crackle of the burning logs and the heavy regular breathing of the couchant she-wolf being the only other sounds audible within the apartment.
Gilles de Retz wrote on, smiling to himself as he added line after line to his manuscript.

His beard shone with a truculent blue-black lustre.

For the moment the aged look had quite gone out of his face.
His cheek appeared flushed with the hues of youth and reinvigorated hope, yet withal of a youth without innocence or charm.

Rather it seemed as if fresh blood had been injected into the veins of some aged demon, moribund and cruel, giving, instead of health or grace, only a new lease of cruelty and lust.
Presently another door opened, the main entrance of the apartment this time, not the small private portal through which Astarte the wolf had been admitted.