Adeline looked infinitely beautiful: for though the face had little more colour in it than there is in Parian marble, the features retained all their exquisite contour, the flowing hair its silky waves, the dark-brown, lustrous eyes their sweet and sad expression. In the midst of Adeline de Castella's brilliant loveliness, there was, and always had been, a peculiar expression of sadness pervading her countenance. It never failed to strike on the notice of the beholder, investing such a face as hers with a singular interest, but it was more than usually observable since her illness. Was it that the unearthly part of her, the spirit, conscious of and mourning for what was in store for her, cast its shadow upon her features? The girls crowded round silently to look at Adeline's teeth, for one day, during the time she lay ill, Charlotte Singleton had said that the transparent teeth of Adeline de Castella were an indication of a consumptive tendency, and the girls could not agree amongst themselves whether they were so very transparent. "So I have come to see you at last," began Adeline, as she sat down with her two friends, Rose and Mary, on the bench outside the schoolroom windows. "What hot weather has come in all at once!" "Adeline, how long your illness has been! We heard you were going to Nice." "Not until autumn. And I don't know whether it will be Nice." "There's Julie!" cried Rose, springing up. "Julie, who's fetched?" "Pas vous, mademoiselle," answered the servant, laughing at Rose's anxiety. "Ah bah! Adeline, we have heard something else. Ah! you know what I mean. Is it true?" "I believe it is," she answered, a faint blush upon her face, and a careless smile. "Is he handsome?" continued Rose. Of course the first thought that would arise to _her_. "I have never seen him." "Oh, Adeline!" uttered Mary Carr, involuntarily, whilst Rose stared with unqualified amazement. "Not yet. He comes from Paris this week to pay us a visit." "Who is he?" "The Baron de la Chasse. Do you recollect seeing, on my ball night, an old gentleman who remained most of the evening by the side of papa?" "Yes. Well?" answered Rose, impatiently. "It seems he made overtures then to papa for my hand, though I did not know it, and----" "It is a sin, an unholy thing, to sacrifice you to an old man!" interrupted Mary Carr, starting up in her sharp disappointment. "Why, his sands of life must be well-nigh run out!" "A moment, Mary," rejoined Adeline, calmly laying her hand upon Miss Carr's arm: "who is hasty now? That old man's sands are run out. He died soon after he had played his part in that festal night, which he had come down from Paris purposely to join in. He and papa were old and very dear friends; closer friends it would not be possible to conceive, though there was a difference of twenty years in their ages. His nephew inherits his fortune and title, and it is for him they destine me." "How old is he?" inquired Rose.