From this, and various other circumstances which occurred in the course of their first few days at Innsbruck, it began to dawn dimly upon Florian’s open mind that their American friend, though she knew not the Van Rensselaers, the Vanderbilts, and the Livingstones, must have been “comfortably left” by the late Mr Palmer. It was clear she had money for every whim and fancy. She took frequent drives, up the Brenner or down the Innthal, in a roomy two-horse carriage specially ordered from the livery stables; and she always gave a seat to one at least of the giggling inarticulates; and then, “on the girl’s account, you know,” with good-natured zeal, asked Will and Florian to take part in the expedition. “It’s so good for them, of course,” she said, “to see a little, when they can, of young men’s society. They’re each of them here with an invalid mamma—throat and lungs, poor things—you know the kind of person; and before I came, they had nobody to talk to, not even one another, for they were far too much afraid of a mutual snub ever to utter a syllable. I’ve tried to bring them out a bit, and make life worth living for them. But without a young man—at that age—no amusement’s worth anything. _Do_ come, Mr Deverill—there’s a good soul, just to humour them.” And Will and Florian, it must be candidly allowed, fell in with a good grace with her philanthropic projects. Though, to be sure, when once the carriage got under way, they seemed much more desirous of amusing the pretty American herself, than of seconding her schemes for drawing out the latent conversational powers of the giggling inarticulates, who contented themselves chiefly with leaning back in their seats, and listening open-mouthed to Florian’s flamboyant disquisitions. That, however, is a detail. Will attempted at first to pay his share of the carriage; but such interference with her plans Mrs Palmer most manfully and successfully resisted. She wanted to give the girls a little outing, she said; Will might come or he might stop; but she wasn’t going to let any other person pay for her well-meant attention to her poor little protégées. To that point she stuck hard, through thick and thin. They must come as her guests if they came as anything.