"I have done all I could to make her aware of my respectful devotion," said the young man, with a certain formality which came to him in the air of the unaccustomed foreign place; "but, indeed, I have no reason to flatter myself. My hope is that the objections which she thought valid in my cousin's house might not exist here." "Ah, it was in your cousin's house. Then that explains----" Madame Castel said. She gave a sigh of relief. "I had been fearing something, I know not what. She came so suddenly, without any warning but a telegram. I see it now." "Mother, what is it you see now?" Claire came into the room, bringing the air of the morning with her, a fresh waft of outdoor atmosphere. She was not the Mademoiselle of the Square. There was a freedom in her movements--the freedom of a woman at home--not the enforced sobriety of an official. Her look was alert and bright; she had found pleasure in her native air, in the surroundings she loved: and yet there was a line of anxiety in her forehead. She was emancipated for the moment, and keenly felt the warm thrill of independence; but she was anxious for her future, and that of her mother, and full of care. Pleased, yet anxious and full of care--it seemed a contradiction in words--and yet Charles Wargrave saw all that, and read more, written in her face. She had not seen him as he sat within the shadow of the door, and, he thought, he had never seen her before, free to express any emotion, free to come and go as she pleased, carrying her heart in her face. "I have not been successful," she said. "Never mind; better luck will come to-morrow. They say I am quite sure to hear of something before----Mr Wargrave!" she cried, with a sudden step back. The blood rushed to her face and then forsook it. Her brow clouded, her countenance fell. "Yes, Mademoiselle Claire." He had risen to his feet, and stood before her with a painful, whimsical consciousness that he could not bow like a Frenchman, which, perhaps, was the sort of thing to please her, shooting through his mind even in the excitement of the moment, and all the eager rush of feeling roused by seeing her again in this new phase. Claire was too much startled to know what she was saying. A flood of strange feelings seemed to carry her away. Her head, which she had carried with such airy grace, drooped; something seemed to dazzle her eyes. "I did not expect," she said, faltering, "to see you here."