glitter.

'You seem surprised, Monsieur de Laval,' said he.

'For God's sake,' said I, 'do not trifle with me any further! Who are
you, and what is this place to which you have taken me?'

For answer he broke into one of his dry chuckles, and, laying his skinny
brown hand upon my wrist, he led me into a large apartment. In the
centre was a table, tastefully laid, and beyond it in a low chair a
young lady was seated, with a book in her hand. She rose as we entered,
and I saw that she was tall and slender, with a dark face, pronounced
features, and black eyes of extraordinary brilliancy. Even in that one
glance it struck me that the expression with which she regarded me was
by no means a friendly one.

'Sibylle,' said my host, and his words took the breath from my lips,
'this is your cousin from England, Louis de Laval. This, my dear
nephew, is my only daughter, Sibylle Bernac.'

'Then you--'

'I am your mother's brother, Charles Bernac.'

'You are my Uncle Bernac!' I stammered at him like an idiot. 'But why
did you not tell me so?' I cried.

'I was not sorry to have a chance of quietly observing what his English
education had done for my nephew. It might also have been harder for me
to stand your friend if my comrades had any reason to think that I was
personally interested in you. But you will permit me now to welcome you
heartily to France, and to express my regret if your reception has been
a rough one. I am sure that Sibylle will help me to atone for it.'
He smiled archly at his daughter, who continued to regard me with a
stony face.

I looked round me, and gradually the spacious room, with the weapons
upon the wall, and the deer's heads, came dimly back to my memory.
That view through the oriel window, too, with the clump of oaks in the
sloping park, and the sea in the distance beyond, I had certainly seen
it before. It was true then, and I was in our own castle of Grosbois,
and this dreadful man in the snuff-coloured coat, this sinister plotter
with the death's-head face, was the man whom I had heard my poor father
curse so often, the man who had ousted him from his own property and
installed himself in his place. And yet I could not forget that it was
he also who, at some risk to himself, had saved me the night before, and
my soul was again torn between my gratitude and my repulsion.

We had seated ourselves at the table, and as we ate, this newly-found
uncle of mine continued to explain a