Peyrolles went on: "While the Prince de Gonzague lives a bright life, and sets the mode in wit, dress, vice--in every way the perfect gentleman, and now the favorite companion and friend of his melancholy majesty, whose natural sadness at the loss of the great cardinal he does his best to alleviate." Æsop laughed mockingly as Peyrolles mouthed his approvals. "Lucky groom. But if he can spend the money, why does he want the girl?" Peyrolles answered, promptly: "To please the princess, and prove himself the devoted husband." Æsop was persistent: "What is the real reason?" Peyrolles, with a grimace, again consented to be frank: "As Mademoiselle de Nevers is not proved to be dead, the law assumes her to be alive, and it is as the guardian of this impalpable young person that my dear master handles the revenues of Nevers. If she were certainly dead, my master would inherit." Æsop still required information. "Then why the devil does he want to prove that she lives?" There was again a touch of condescension in Peyrolles's manner: "You are not so keen as you think, good Æsop. Mademoiselle de Nevers, recovered, restored to her mother's arms, the recognized heiress of so much wealth, might seem to be a very lucky young woman. But even lucky young women are not immortal." Æsop chuckled. "Oh, oh, oh! If the lost-and-found young lady were to die soon after her recovery the good Louis de Gonzague would inherit without further question. I fear my little gypsy is not promised a long life." Peyrolles smiled sourly. "Let me see your little gypsy." Æsop hesitated for a moment. It evidently went against his grain to oblige Peyrolles--or, for that matter, any man, in anything; but in this instance to oblige served his own turn. He rose, and, passing the door of the Inn, crossed the space of common land to where the caravan stood, a deserted monument of green and red. The hunchback tapped at the door and whispered through the lock: "Are you there, Flora?" A woman's voice answered from within--a young voice, a sweet voice, a slightly impatient voice. "Yes," it said. "Come out," Æsop commanded, curtly. Then the gaudy door of the caravan yielded, and a pretty gypsy girt appeared in the opening. She was dark-haired, she was bright-eyed, she was warmly colored. She seemed to be about eighteen years of age, but her figure already had a rich Spanish fulness and her carriage was swaying and voluptuous. Most men would have been glad enough to stand for a while in adoration of so pleasing a picture, but Æsop was not as most men. His attitude to women when they concerned him personally was not of adoration. In this case the girl did not concern him personally, and he had no interest in her youth or her charms save in so far as they might serve the business he had in hand. The girl looked at him with a little frown, and spoke with a little note of fretfulness in her voice: "So you have come at last. I have been so tired of waiting for you, mewed up in there."