again and struck a few chords, while Isabel sat down nearer
the instrument. Suddenly the new-comer stopped with her hands on the
keys, half-turning and looking over her shoulder. She was forty years
old and not pretty, though her expression charmed. "Pardon me," she
said; "but are you the niece--the young American?"

"I'm my aunt's niece," Isabel replied with simplicity.

The lady at the piano sat still a moment longer, casting her air of
interest over her shoulder. "That's very well; we're compatriots." And
then she began to play.

"Ah then she's not French," Isabel murmured; and as the opposite
supposition had made her romantic it might have seemed that this
revelation would have marked a drop. But such was not the fact; rarer
even than to be French seemed it to be American on such interesting
terms.

The lady played in the same manner as before, softly and solemnly, and
while she played the shadows deepened in the room. The autumn twilight
gathered in, and from her place Isabel could see the rain, which had now
begun in earnest, washing the cold-looking lawn and the wind shaking the
great trees. At last, when the music had ceased, her companion got up
and, coming nearer with a smile, before Isabel had time to thank her
again, said: "I'm very glad you've come back; I've heard a great deal
about you."

Isabel thought her a very attractive person, but nevertheless spoke with
a certain abruptness in reply to this speech. "From whom have you heard
about me?"

The stranger hesitated a single moment and then, "From your uncle," she
answered. "I've been here three days, and the first day he let me come
and pay him a visit in his room. Then he talked constantly of you."

"As you didn't know me that must rather have bored you."

"It made me want to know you. All the more that since then--your aunt
being so much with Mr. Touchett--I've been quite alone and have got
rather tired of my own society. I've not chosen a good moment for my
visit."

A servant had come in with lamps and was presently followed by another
bearing the tea-tray. On the appearance of this repast Mrs. Touchett had
apparently been notified, for she now arrived and addressed herself to
the tea-pot. Her greeting to her niece did not differ materially from
her manner of raising the lid of this receptacle in order to glance at
the contents: in neither act was it becoming to make a show of avidity.
Questioned about her husband she was unable to say he wa