The next day there was a violent storm of wind and rain. The Count did not venture out. “I will get ready for my visit to Corsica,” he said to himself. About noon he was summoned by Timothée, who said a gentleman wished to see him in the library.
The visitor was a stout man with a full, round face, made even fuller and rounder by a thick beard.
“I wish to see the Countess Mont d’Oro.”
“I regret to say, sir, that she is absent from the city. I am Count Mont d’Oro, her son.”
“Is Miss Renville here?” was the next inquiry.
“She has been my mother’s guest—they have gone together.”
“I am sorry to hear that,” said the stout man. “I am Mr. Thomas Glynne, of Buckholme, in Berkshire. I am the young lady’s guardian. She ran away from home with the intention, I think, of marrying a chance acquaintance—an unworthy young man—and I have come to Paris to take her home with me as I have a right to do, under the law.”
“Who is this unworthy young man?” asked the Count.
“His name is De Vinne.”
“I judge,” said the Count, “from something I have heard, that she is in love with him. I know that she writes to him and that she was expecting him here before she left Paris.”