“I knew he would be interested. She gave us some milk, and she has been telling us her story. She’s quite young, and she owns the inn, although it’s very hard work to run it, she says. She only has one woman and a potman. Her mother was a famous actress, who made a lot of money and bought the inn and improved it. She died when Mademoiselle was fifteen.”
“Who was her father?”
“I don’t know. I rather gather that her father was a bad lot. He died, too.”
“How old is she?”
“Not much more than twenty.”
“Then her mother must have been thirty-nine when she died.”
“What makes you say so?”
“Of course she must have been. What happened to the old man?”
“What old man?”
“Her grandfather.”