"Well, wouldn't it be worth while to spend them?" asked the girl. "I certainly——" She stopped in the midst of her sentence, a bright flush springing to her face; for turning a corner of the avenue which brought them close to the château, they came suddenly upon a young woman, dressed in black, who must have heard their last words.
Instantly George Trent had his hat in his hand, and before Virginia could speak he had dismounted and plunged into explanations. He begged pardon for the intrusion, and said that, as they had seen the announcement that the château was for sale, they had ventured to ride up in the hope of being allowed to see the house. As he spoke, in fairly good though rather laboured French, he smiled on the girl in black with a charming smile, very like Virginia's. And Lady Gardiner looked from one to the other gravely. She was not as pleased as she had been that George Trent had come here with them, for the girl in the shabby black dress had a curiously arresting, if not beautiful face, and her surroundings, the background of the desolate castle, and the circumstances of the meeting, framed her in romance.
Lady Gardiner did not like the alacrity with which Trent had snatched off his hat and sprung from his horse, nor did she approve of the expression in his eyes, though Virginia's were just as eager.
To the surprise of all three, the girl answered in English; not the English of a French jeune fille, instructed by an imported "Miss," but the English of an Englishwoman, pure and sweet, though the voice was sad and lifeless. Her melancholy dark eyes, deep and sombre as mountain tarns, wandered from the brother's handsome face to the beautiful one of the sister.
"Pray don't speak of an intrusion," she said. "Our servant will be glad to show you through the house, and afterward, if you really think of buying the place, he will give you the address of an agent in Mentone who can tell you everything."
"Then shan't we find you again when we have seen the château?" asked Virginia wistfully.
The girl smiled for the first time, but there was no brightness in the smile. "I shall be very pleased to speak with you before you go if there is anything you care to say to me," she replied, mechanically raising the great bunch of heliotrope she had been gathering to her lips.
"Now I will call our servant. He will put up your horses while you go in; though I'm afraid that we have no very good accommodation for them, as our stables have been empty for a long time."
"Oh, thank you, we needn't give him that trouble," said Trent. "I can fasten the horses' bridles to some tree or other, and they will be all right."
The girl disappeared, a slender, youthful figure in the plain black gown, yet her step, though it was not slow, had none of the lithsomeness of youth. She seemed to have lost all joy of life, though she could scarcely have been more than twenty-two or three.