Everyone who knew Gabrielle, sooner or later, asked themselves if she had a heart; and nobody amongst those most intimate with her, had yet been able to answer the question at all satisfactorily, excepting Lord Delaval. But he did not seem to deem it worth his while to study her at all, though indirectly, and at all favourable opportunities, he let her be fully aware through the medium of his handsome eyes and his voice that he _knew_ she had a heart, and that it was one he read like an open book and found remarkably interesting. According to Dickens, there are chords in the human heart--strange varying strings which are only struck by accident, which will remain mute and senseless to appeals the most passionate and earnest, and respond at last to the slightest casual touch. And so it is with Gabrielle. She has reached over a quarter of a century. Her nature is as passionate as that of a daughter of the south, and her early nurturing has been as wild and free as an Arab’s; but no man’s hand had struck the keynote of feeling until Lord Delaval put in an appearance on the scene. He came, he saw, he conquered; and Gabrielle fell down at once, helplessly and hopelessly, to worship him. CHAPTER II. FLIRTATION. “What the years mean--how time dies, and is not slain, How love grows, and laughs, and cries and wanes again, These were things she came to know and take the measure, When her play was played out so for one man’s pleasure.” Gabrielle’s cheeks grow crimson and her eyes glitter with pleasure, that for a little while they two will be alone, with no stranger to intermeddle with their joy, as she watches Lord Delaval approach nearer and nearer and finally step over the sill of the casement. There is always a peculiar directness, an odd sort of intimacy in his manner towards her, whenever they are thrown alone together, that produces at once a most unconventional effect. Now, as he walks up towards the sofa where she sits, the orthodox smile of greeting is lacking on his handsome face, the ordinary hand-clasp is unoffered, and Gabrielle does not even attempt to rise from her nest of downy cushions, while her face droops away a little from his gaze. There is just a softer gleam in the big black eyes, a quick, nervous pressure of the even white teeth on the full, red underlip, and these are the only signs that she recognises his presence on the scene. But Lord Delaval--confident and complacent--requires no spoken welcome. He has come in not knowing who he may find in the room, but finding Gabrielle, is ready, _faute de mieux_, to make love to her in the underhand way that does not compromise a man, and passes away an hour.