rested in her when they
became aware that she had been left by her husband with an income of two
thousand pounds a year. She had had several offers of marriage since her
widowhood, but not one of the men who had come and said he loved her had
confessed as much about himself as this stranger had done.

She was the more touched and interested because the Frenchman's manner
was extremely reserved. Even in the short time she had been at the Villa
du Lac, Sylvia had realised that though the Count was on speaking terms
with most of his fellow-guests, he seemed intimate with none of the
people whose happy chatter had filled the dining-room the night before.

Just before going back into the Villa, Sylvia stopped short; she fixed
her large ingenuous eyes on the Count's face.

"I want to thank you again," she said diffidently, "for your kindness
in giving me this warning. You know we in England have a proverb,
'Forewarned is forearmed.' Well, believe me, I will not forget what you
have said, and--and I am grateful for your confidence. Of course, I
regard it as quite private."

The Count looked at her for a moment in silence, and then he said very
deliberately,

"I am afraid the truth about me is known to all those good enough to
concern themselves with my affairs. I am sure, for instance, that your
Polish friend is well aware of it! You see before you a man who has lost
every penny he owned in the world, who does not know how to work, and who
is living on the charity of relations."

Sylvia had never heard such bitter accents issue from human lips before.

"The horse you saw me ride this morning," he went on in a low tone, "is
not my horse; it belongs to my brother-in-law. It is sent for me every
day because my sister loves me, and she thinks my health will suffer if
I do not take exercise. My brother-in-law did not give me the horse,
though he is the most generous of human beings, for he feared that if
he did I should sell it in order that I might have more money for play."

There was a long, painful pause, then in a lighter tone the Count added,
"And now, au revoir, Madame, and forgive me for having thrust my private
affairs on your notice! It is not a thing I have been tempted ever to do
before with one whom I have the honour of knowing as slightly as I know
yourself."

Sylvia went upstairs to her room. She was touched, moved, excited. It was
quite a new experience with her to come so really near to any man's heart
an