The Girl Who Had Nothing

by A. M. Williamson

It was only for a second that the man's soul looked at her from its windows, but it was long enough to make her sharply realise two facts. One, that she was far, far beneath him; the other, that he was the only man in the world for her.

"To think that that girl should know him, and I not!" she said to herself rebelliously. "He is miles too good for me, but he's more miles too good for her, because she hasn't any soul, and I have, even though it's a bad one. Again, after all these years, that girl passes through my life, taking with her as she goes what I would give all I own, all I might ever gain, to have. It's Kismet--nothing less."

"Ah, Comtesse, bon jour!" murmured a voice that Joan knew, and then it went on in very good English, with only a slight foreign accent: "You are charming to-day, but you do not see your friends. They must remind you of their existence before they can win a bow."

"I have just seen some one who was like a ghost out of the past," returned Joan, with a careless smile for the handsome, dark young man who had stopped to greet her.

"What!" his face lighted up. "You know that young lady you were looking at? That is indeed interesting, and I will tell you why, presently, if you will let me. If you would but introduce me--at all events, to the father. The rest I can do for myself."

"I don't know her," said Joan, "although an important issue of my life was associated with the girl. I can't even give you her name."

"I can do as much as that for you," said the Marchese Villa Fora. "She is a Miss Violet Ffrench, and the old man is her father, General Ffrench. Not only is she one of the greatest beauties, but one of the greatest heiresses in England."

"Ah!" said Joan, "no wonder you are interested."

"No wonder. But what good does that do to me, since I have not the honour of her acquaintance, and since she is to marry that great, bronze statue of a fellow?"

A pang shot through Joan's heart, and she was ashamed because it was a jealous pang. "She is to marry him! How do you know that, since you are not acquainted with her?"