"It's glorious, Nan!" he exclaimed.
"Your coming makes it perfect, Jim," she answered, tenderly, and turning to the chauffeur said:
"Drive for an hour before going to the house, Collins."
The chauffeur tipped his cap and the throbbing machine shot around a curve and swept along the river's edge down the green carpeted valley which stretches out for miles below the ramparts of the great chateau on the mountain-side above.
"There's the house, Jim!" Nan cried, pointing to the heights on the left.
Stuart could not suppress an exclamation of delight.
"Magnificent!" he said, with enthusiasm.
As the river made a graceful curve the great building swept into full view—a stunning pile of marble three hundred feet long, its tower piercing the turquoise sky in solemn grandeur. The stone parapet, on which its front wall was built, rose in massive strength a hundred feet from the ledge in the granite cliff before touching the first line of the white stones of the house itself.
At the end a formal garden had been built on the foundations of masonry which cost a hundred thousand dollars.
"What a background that row of live oaks make behind the garden!" he exclaimed.