“Because I cannot help contrasting your position to-day with what it would have been could you but have taken your boy by the hand, and have said to Sir Gilbert: ‘You lost your son and heir long years ago: but to-day I bring you a grandson to take his place. Here is the new heir of Withington Chase.’ In that case, how the old man would have welcomed you!—nothing would have seemed too good for you, so overjoyed would he have been. The position which ought to have been yours from the first would then be accorded you, and you would take your place in society as the daughter-in-law of Sir Gilbert Clare, and the mother of the next heir. And then, a little later, my Vanna, you would marry again. Oh, yes, you would! Marry money—and perhaps a title to boot. Why not? You are one of the handsomest women in London, or else I don’t know a handsome woman when I see one!” Vanna rose abruptly from her chair, and then sat down again. For once she was profoundly moved. “Oh, Uncle, this is the merest folly!” she cried. “Why talk of impossibilities? Let us keep to realities. I thought you had something to propose—something, perhaps, that would——” “So I have, my dear; so I have something to propose,” responded the Captain, with a chuckle. “What I said to you the other day was, ‘There is only one course open to us, and that is to find Sir Gilbert an heir.’” “Well?” demanded Vanna with wide-open eyes. “I failed to understand your meaning then and I am not a bit the wiser now.” “Listen then. Although, owing to circumstances to which I need not further refer, we are not in a position to go before Sir Gilbert and produce the real heir, is that any reason why we should not find a substitute who would answer both his purpose and ours just as well as the genuine article?” His cunning eyes were watching her eagerly. Vanna’s face expressed a growing wonder, but it was a wonder largely compounded of bewilderment. “_Ecoutez_,” resumed her uncle. “Let us assume for the moment that you agree with me what a very desirable thing it would be to provide Sir Gilbert with an heir, even though it would, of necessity, have to be a fictitious one. Being, then, so far in accord, naturally the first question would be, ‘But where are we to find the heir in question—or rather, someone by whom he could be personated?’ To which I should reply that I am prepared at any moment to lay my finger on the one person out of all the hundreds and thousands of people in this big city best suited to our purpose. That person is none other than your own nephew (whom I believe you have never yet set eyes on), the son of your only brother, Luigi Rispani.” Sheer amazement kept Giovanna silent.