"Do forgive me," she said in English. "I had to come. I could not sleep last night. I got up before any one else was awake, because I—because I wanted so much to see you, that I couldn't wait: and I wanted to come to you alone."
Madeleine Dalahaide's faint frown relaxed. Virginia in that mood was irresistible, even to a woman. Still the girl in black did not smile. She had almost forgotten that it was necessary and polite to force a smile for strangers. She had been so much alone, she and sorrow had grown so intimate, that she had become almost primitively sincere. The ordinary, pleasant little hypocrisies of the society in which she had once lived during what now seemed another state of existence, no longer existed for her.
Nevertheless, she was not discourteous. "You are kind to have taken this trouble," she said. "It is something about the château, no doubt—some questions which perhaps you forgot to ask yesterday?"
The old man, who understood not a word of English, had discreetly and noiselessly retired, now that fate had taken the management of the situation from his hands. The two girls were alone in the great hall, the chapel door still open behind Madeleine Dalahaide, giving her a background of red and purple light from a stained-glass window.
"No," Virginia answered. "If I said that business about the château brought me, it would be merely an excuse. It would make things easier for me in beginning, but—I wish to say to you only things that are really true. I came because—because I want to help you."
The white oval of the other's face was suddenly suffused with scarlet. The dark head was lifted on the slender throat.
"Thank you," she said coldly. "But I am not in need of help. If that is your reason for thinking of buying this house, I beg——"
"But it is not my reason. What can I say that you won't misunderstand? There is one whom you love. Just now you were praying for him in that chapel. I know it. You were praying to God to help him, weren't you? What if I should be an instrument sent you to be used for that purpose?"
The tragic eyes stared at the eager, beautiful face, dazed and astonished.
Virginia went on, not seeming to choose her words, but letting them flow as they would.