CHAPTER I.
A GIRL WITH A CHARACTER
It was a strange place for an intelligence office, yet Madame Selini evidently knew what she was doing when she established her office in an aristocratic neighborhood, and actually next door to the family mansion of the Countess Dowager of Barewood. The worthy countess was shocked, and, taking counsel of her hopes, predicted that Madame Selini's institution would soon prove a failure. Notwithstanding this prediction, the agency prospered, and among its patrons were many of the nobility.
One fine morning in May a carriage stopped before Madame Selini's door, and from it descended a handsome, aristocratic gentleman, evidently of the old school. There was some little commotion in the interior of the building, and then a foot-page appeared to whom Sir Oswald Darrell – for that was the gentleman's name – gave his card.
"I am here by appointment," he said, "to see Madame Selini."
He was ushered into a handsomely furnished room, where, in a few minutes, he was joined by Madame Selini herself – a quick, bright Frenchwoman, whose dark eyes seemed to embrace everything in their comprehensive glance. Sir Oswald bowed with stately courtesy and quaint, old-fashioned grace.
"Have you been so fortunate, madame, as to find that which I am in search of?" he inquired.
"I think you will be pleased, Sir Oswald – nay, I am sure you will," answered the lady. "I have a lady waiting to see you now, who will prove, I should say, a treasure."
Sir Oswald bowed, and madame continued:
"Miss Hastings – Miss Agnes Hastings – has been for the last six years finishing governess at Lady Castledine's, and her two pupils make their debut this year; so that there is no longer any occasion for her services."
"And you think she would be fitted, madame, to occupy the position for which I require a lady of talent and refinement?"
"I am quite sure of it," replied madame. "Miss Hastings is thirty years of age. She is highly accomplished, and her manners are exceedingly lady-like. She is a person of great refinement; moreover, she has had great experience with young girls. I do not think, Sir Oswald, that you could do better."
"Is the lady here? Can I see her?"
Madame Selini rang, and desired the little page to ask Miss Hastings to come to her. In a few minutes an elegant, well-dressed lady entered the room. She advanced with a quiet grace and dignity that seemed natural to her; there was not the slightest trace of awkwardness or mauvaise honte in her manner.
Madame Selini introduced her to Sir Oswald Darrell.
"I will leave you," she said, "to discuss your private arrangements."
Madame quitted the room with gliding, subtle grace, and then Sir Oswald, in his courtly fashion, placed a chair for Miss Hastings. He looked at the pale, clear-cut face for a few minutes in silence, as though he were at a loss what to say, and then he commenced suddenly:
"I suppose Madame Selini has told you what I want, Miss Hastings?"
"Yes," was the quiet reply; "your niece has been neglected – you want some one to take the entire superintendence of her."
"Neglected!" exclaimed Sir Oswald. "My dear madame, that is a mild word, which does not express the dreadful reality. I wish to disguise nothing from you, I assure you – she literally horrifies me."
Miss Hastings smiled.
"Neglected!" he repeated – "the girl is a savage – a splendid savage – nothing more nor less."
"Has she not received any kind of training, then, Sir Oswald?"
"Training! My dear madame, can you imagine what a wild vine is – a vine that has never been cultivated or pruned, but allowed to grow wild in all its natural beauty and strength, to cling where it would, to trail on the ground and to twine round forest trees? Such a vine is a fit type of my niece."
Miss Hastings looked slightly bewildered. Here was a very different pupil from the elegant, graceful daughters of Lady Castledine.
"I should, perhaps," continued Sir Oswald, "explain to you the peculiar position that my niece, Miss Pauline Darrell, has occupied."
His grand old face flushed, and his stately head was bowed, as though some of the memories that swept over him were not free from shame; and then, with a little gesture of his white hand, on which shone a large diamond ring, he said:
"There is no need for me to tell you, Miss Hastings, that the Darrells are one of the oldest families in England – ancient, honorable, and, I must confess, proud – very proud. My father, the late Sir Hildebert Darrell, was, I should say, one of the proudest and most reserved of men. He had but two children, myself and a daughter twelve years younger – my sister Felicia. I was educated abroad. It was one of my father's fancies that I should see many lands, that I should study men and women before settling down to my right position in the world; so that I knew but little of my sister Felicia. She was a child when I left home – the tragedy of her life had happened before I returned."
Again a great rush of color came over the pale, aristocratic face.
"I must apologize, Miss Hastings, for troubling you with these details, but unless you understand them you will not understand my niece. I cannot tell you how it happened, but it did so happen that while I was away my sister disgraced herself; she left home with a French artist, whom Sir Hildebert had engaged to renovate some choice and costly pictures at Darrell Court. How it came about I cannot say – perhaps there were excuses for her. She may have found home very dull – my father was harsh and cold, and her mother was dead. It may be that when the young artist told her of warm love in sunny lands she was tempted, poor child, to leave the paternal roof.
"My father's wrath was terrible; he pursued Julian L'Estrange with unrelenting fury. I believe the man would have been a successful artist but for my father, who had vowed to ruin him, and who never rested until he had done so – until he had reduced him to direst poverty – and then my sister appealed for help, and my father refused to grant it. He would not allow her name to be mentioned among us; her portrait was destroyed; everything belonging to her was sent away from Darrell Court.
"When I returned – in an interview that I shall never forget – my father threatened me not only with disinheritance, but with his curse, if I made any attempt to hold the least communication with my sister. I do not know that I should have obeyed him if I could have found her, but I did not even know what part of the world she was in. She died, poor girl, and I have no doubt that her death was greatly hastened by privation. My father told me of her death, also that she had left one daughter; he did more – he wrote to Julian L'Estrange, and offered to adopt his daughter on the one condition that he would consent never to see her or hold the least communication with her.
"The reply was, as you may imagine, a firm refusal and a fierce denunciation. In the same letter came a note, written in a large, childish hand:
"'I love my papa, and I do not love you. I will not come to live with you. You are a cruel man, and you helped to kill my dear mamma.'
"It was a characteristic little note, and was signed 'Pauline L'Estrange.' My father's anger on receiving it was very great. I confess that I was more amused than angry.
"My father, Miss Hastings, lived to a good old age. I was not a young man when I succeeded him. He left me all his property. You must understand the Darrell and Audleigh Royal estates are not entailed. He made no mention in his will of the only grandchild he had; but, after I had arranged all my affairs, I resolved to find her. For ten years I have been doing all I could – sending to France, Italy, Spain, and every country where I thought it possible the artist might have sought refuge.
"Three months since I received a letter from him, written on his death-bed, asking me to do something for Pauline, who had grown up into a beautiful girl of seventeen. I found then that he had been living for some years in the Rue d'Orme, Paris. I buried him, brought his daughter to England, and made arrangements whereby she should assume the name of Darrell. But I little knew what a task I had undertaken. Pauline ought to be my heiress, Miss Hastings. She ought to succeed me at Darrell Court. I have no