Page:The Avenger.djvu/167

 answered. "I had a fancy to revisit the place. And you?"

"I discovered it entirely by accident," Wrayson admitted. "I walked out from Chourville this morning, stayed here for some luncheon, and was so delighted that I took a room and went straight back for my bag. There isn't an emperor in Europe who has so beautiful a dining-room as this!"

Together they looked across the valley, a wonderful panorama of vine-clad slopes and meadows, starred with many-coloured wild flowers, through which the river wound its way, now hidden, now visible, a thin line of gleaming quicksilver. Tall poplars fringed its banks, and there were white cottages and farmhouses, mostly built in the shelter of the vine-covered cliffs. To the left a rolling mass of woods was pierced by one long green avenue, at the summit of which stretched the grey front and towers of the Château de St. Étarpe. Wrayson looked long at the fertile and beautiful country, which seemed to fade so softly away in the horizon; but he looked longest at the château amongst the woods.

"I wonder who lives there," he remarked. "I meant to have asked the waiter."

"I can tell you," the stranger said. "The château belongs to the Baroness de Sturm."

"A Frenchwoman?" Wrayson asked.

"Half French, half Belgian. She has estates in both countries, I believe," his companion answered. "As a matter of fact, I believe that this château is hers in her own right as a daughter of the Étarpes. She married a Belgian nobleman."

"You seem well acquainted with the neighbourhood," Wrayson remarked.