Caroline Childers came forward to welcome the Duke when he entered the drawing-room.
"I am so glad to see you," she said; "how did you ever find the way?"
"I had a very accurate map of the coast," replied the Duke.
"But how did you cross the mountains? The keeper's lodge was closed; there was no one to meet you. I am so sorry."
"On the contrary," answered the Duke, "there was a most delightful person to meet me."
"I am glad," said the girl, "but I am puzzled. Was it one of our servants?"
"I asked him that," replied the Duke, "and he said that he used the word 'servant' only in his prayers."
"Oh," said the girl, "I understand. It was a native. Then you were surely entertained."
"I have not been so entertained in half a lifetime," replied the Duke.
This dialogue, running before so charged a situation, seemed to the man like some sort of prelude to a drama. The moment became, for him, a vivid, luminous period. In it impressions flashed on him with the rapidity of light; details of the great drawing-room richly fitted, its Venetian mirrors, treasures of a Doge. But, more than any other thing, he saw the beauty of the girl who came up the drawingroom to meet him, who stood beside him, who spoke to him in the soft, deliberate accents of the South. He noted every detail of her, her hair, her long lashes, her exquisite mouth, her slim body, and the man's senses panted, as with a physical thirst.