"Where is he, Isaac?" she asked, hardly knowing what fell from her lips. "In the dining-room, ma'am." "I will come down." Isaac left the room, and Claire drew a long breath. Who could it be? Some one who had forgotten that May was married, and then recalled it! What did it mean? She stood with her hands tightly clasped, gazing straight before her, and then walked quickly to the door, and down into the dining-room, so quietly that the short, slight man gazing out of the window did not hear her entrance. Claire was puzzled while for the moment she gazed at the attitude of her visitor, whose long black hair fell over the collar of his tightly-buttoned surtout, as he stood with one hand resting upon his hip, the other holding his hat and tasselled cane. She drew a breath of relief. It was no one she knew, of that she felt sure. Perhaps it was no fresh trouble after all. As if divining the presence of some one in the room, the visitor just then turned quickly, displaying handsome aquiline features, with the olive skin and dark eyes of a young man of about thirty, who threw down his hat and cane and advanced smiling. "My dear Miss Denville--my dear Claire!" he exclaimed, speaking with a foreign accent. Claire stood as if frozen, gazing at him in horror. "M. Gravani!" she cried at last in a hoarse whisper. "Say Louis," he said eagerly, taking her hands and kissing them. "Why not? Surely my dear May told you--that she is my wife. No, no, do not be angry with me. It was wrong, I know. But you--you were always so sweet and good and kind, dear Claire!" He kissed her hands again, and she stood as if in a dream while he went on--speaking fervidly. "You, so tender, and who loved dear May so much. You will forgive me. We were so young--I was so poor--I dared not speak. What would the Signore Denville have said? That I was mad. May must have told you-- she did tell you we were married?" "Yes--yes," said Claire slowly, "she told me." "That is well. And the old man--the good father, she told him, too!" "No," said Claire, still in the same slow, dreamy way, as she strove to listen to her visitor, and at the same time work out in her own mind the meaning of the horrible situation in which her sister was placed. "She did not tell him? She promised me she would. But the servant told me he knew that May was married." "Yes," stammered Claire; "he knew."