“Engaged to be married!”
“Yes.”
“This is news to me! I never even suspected such a thing. Nor do I know how she has ever had an opportunity of being wooed, far less won!” exclaimed the lady, in surprise.
“And yet the child honestly thinks that you know all about it,” replied the earl.
“I know nothing. And I am really distressed at the news you tell me. Have I been so absorbed in the care of my sick husband as to have neglected the interests of the orphan child? What adventurer has picked her up, in the name of Heaven? Tell me, Francis, if you know.”
“Do you know anything of a young fellow called Roland Bayard?” significantly inquired the earl, fixing his eyes intently on the face of his sister.
That face paled under his wistful gaze; but the lady recovered herself in a few moments, and replied:
“Yes; he is a young man who in infancy was cast upon our shores from a wrecked ship. He was cared for by Mr. Force, who placed him in the charge of a respectable woman and afterward sent him to school and to college.”
“Does any one know anything about his parentage?”
“He was the sole survivor of the wreck. There was not a mark on his clothing or on his person to give a clew to his parentage. But, as Mr. Force has practically adopted him, he will not need to investigate his own antecedents. He is in the merchant service now.”