later, four years after my baby's death and my father's forgiveness, that I married the Count. Katrine, darling, I gave him a great affection and entire devotion, but my heart died with the first love. To have that first year over! Ah, there was never another like him! You could never know, Katrine, how different he was from others."
"It was long ago?" Katrine asked.
"Thirty years. Dermott has recently been demanding papers of me. It seems there may be some property in America belonging to my first husband which he can claim for me."
A premonition of the truth came to Katrine at the sound of Dermott's name.
"And your first husband's name?" she inquired. "Will it pain you to tell it?"
"Not at all," the Countess answered, with a sad smile. "It was Francis Ravenel."
The sound of the name itself brought no shock to Katrine. She seemed to have heard it before it was spoken, but she made no sign.
She knew it was Frank's father of whom Madame de Nemours spoke, and the tales of him in North Carolina had more than prepared her for wild doings in his student days. It seemed strange, however, that Frank had never spoken of an early marriage of his father. But the more
she thought of it, the firmer became her belief that he had never known it.
It was not until the gray of the following morning that she comprehended to the full the weighty significance of Madame de Nemours' early marriage, and saw clearly the significance of Dermott's stay in Carolina, with the direful resulting that might come to Frank from the Irishman's investigations there.