not like
saying anything so unkind. You must not let it prejudice you against
her; but she gives me always the impression of a person who leads two
lives--one that everybody sees and one that nobody understands save
herself."

"How old should you imagine her to be?" I asked; and again my sister
looked uneasily at me.

"We have been in the habit of considering her a young girl," she
replied, "but do you know, Edgar, I believe she is more than thirty?"

"It is impossible!" I cried. "Why, Clare, she does not look a day more
than eighteen."

"She is what the French people call well preserved. She will look no
older for the next ten years. She has a girl's figure and a girl's face,
but a woman's heart, Edgar, I am sure of it."

"She is thirty, you say, and has been here for five years; that would
make her a woman of twenty-five before she left France. A French woman
of twenty-five has lived her life."

"That is just what I mean," she replied. "Rely upon it, for all her
girlish face and girlish ways, Coralie d'Aubergne has lived hers."

"Clare," I asked, half shyly, "how do you like Miss Thesiger?"

A look bright as a sunbeam came over my sister's face.

"Ah! hers is a beautiful nature--sweet, frank, candid, transparent--no
two lives there, Edgar. Her face is as pure as a lily, and her soul is
the same. No need to turn from me, dear; I read your secret when she
came in. If you give me such a sister as that I shall be grateful to
you."

"Then you think there might be some chance for me if I asked her to
become my wife?"

"Assuredly. Why not?"

She said no more, for at that moment Coralie returned; she had been in
the garden gathering some flowers for Clare. The brightest bloom was on
her face; the brightest light was in her eye. Looking at her, it was
impossible to believe that she was anything but a light-hearted happy
girl.

She glanced round the room.

"Your visitors are gone," she said. "I felt sure they were staying for
dinner."

"Coralie," I asked, "Lady Thesiger tells me she has been here a good
deal, yet you do not seem to be on very intimate terms with her?"

"No," she said, with that frank smile that was lovely enough to charm
any one. "I neither like nor admire Lady Thesiger."

Clare uttered a little cry of astonishment.

"Why not?" I asked.

"I should not like to prejudice you against them, Sir Edgar; but as you
ask me, I will tell you. The Thesigers have but one object."

"What is it?"