"I breathe again," says Dora Talbot affectedly.
"I shall traverse every inch of that old tower--haunted room and all--before I am a week older," declares Florence defiantly. After which she smiles at Adrian again, and follows the maid up the broad staircase to her room.
By the end of the week many other visitors have been made welcome at the castle; but none perhaps give so much pleasure to the young baronet as Mrs. Talbot and her cousin.
Miss Delmaine, the only daughter and heiress of an Indian nabob, had taken London by storm this past season; and not only the modern Babylon, but the heart of Adrian Dynecourt as well. She had come home to England on the death of her father about two years ago; and, having no nearer relatives alive, had been kindly received by her cousin, the Hon. Mrs. Talbot, who was then living with her husband in a pretty house in Mayfair.
Six months after Florence Delmaine's arrival, George Talbot had succumbed to a virulent fever; and his widow, upon whom a handsome jointure had been settled, when the funeral and the necessary law worries had come to an end, had intimated to her young cousin that she intended to travel for a year upon the Continent, and that she would be glad, that is--with an elaborate sigh--she would be a degree less miserable, if she, Florence, would accompany her. This delighted Florence. She was wearied with attendance on the sick, having done most of the nursing of the Hon. George, while his wife lamented and slept; and, besides, she was still sore at heart for the loss of her father. The year abroad had passed swiftly; the end of it brought them to Paris once more, where, feeling that her time of mourning might be decently terminated, Mrs. Talbot had discarded her somber robes, and had put herself into the hands of the most fashionable dress-maker she could find.
Florence too discarded mourning for the first time, although her father had been almost two years in his quiet grave amongst the Hills; and, with her cousin, who was now indeed her only friend, if slightly uncongenial, decided to return to London forthwith.
It was early in May, and, with a sensation of extreme and most natural pleasure, the girl looked forward to a few months passed amongst the best of those whom she had learned under her cousin's auspices to regard as "society."
Dora Talbot herself was not by any means dead to the thought that it would be to her advantage to introduce into society a girl, well-born and possessed of an almost fabulous fortune. Stray crumbs must surely fall to her share in a connection of this kind, and such crumbs she was prepared to gather with a thankful heart.