"Yes," was the quiet reply; "your niece has been neglected--you want some one to take the entire superintendence of her." "Neglected!" exclaimed Sir Oswald. "My dear madame, that is a mild word, which does not express the dreadful reality. I wish to disguise nothing from you, I assure you--she literally horrifies me." Miss Hastings smiled. "Neglected!" he repeated--"the girl is a savage--a splendid savage--nothing more nor less." "Has she not received any kind of training, then, Sir Oswald?" "Training! My dear madame, can you imagine what a wild vine is--a vine that has never been cultivated or pruned, but allowed to grow wild in all its natural beauty and strength, to cling where it would, to trail on the ground and to twine round forest trees? Such a vine is a fit type of my niece." Miss Hastings looked slightly bewildered. Here was a very different pupil from the elegant, graceful daughters of Lady Castledine. "I should, perhaps," continued Sir Oswald, "explain to you the peculiar position that my niece, Miss Pauline Darrell, has occupied." His grand old face flushed, and his stately head was bowed, as though some of the memories that swept over him were not free from shame; and then, with a little gesture of his white hand, on which shone a large diamond ring, he said: "There is no need for me to tell you, Miss Hastings, that the Darrells are one of the oldest families in England--ancient, honorable, and, I must confess, proud--very proud. My father, the late Sir Hildebert Darrell, was, I should say, one of the proudest and most reserved of men. He had but two children, myself and a daughter twelve years younger--my sister Felicia. I was educated abroad. It was one of my father's fancies that I should see many lands, that I should study men and women before settling down to my right position in the world; so that I knew but little of my sister Felicia. She was a child when I left home--the tragedy of her life had happened before I returned." Again a great rush of color came over the pale, aristocratic face. "I must apologize, Miss Hastings, for troubling you with these details, but unless you understand them you will not understand my niece. I cannot tell you how it happened, but it did so happen that while I was away my sister disgraced herself; she left home with a French artist, whom Sir Hildebert had engaged to renovate some choice and costly pictures at Darrell Court. How it came about I cannot say--perhaps there were excuses for her. She may have found home very dull--my father was harsh and cold, and her mother was dead. It may be that when the young artist told her of warm love in sunny lands she was tempted, poor child, to leave the paternal roof.