The woman who had deserted the rich nabob.
With uneasy, tottering steps the old scholar paced the room, watching the two women in a grim silence, until Justine Delande, with a woman's questioning eyes, pointed to the rooms above.
"Before ye go, and I'll now give ye these whole papers and documents, I would say that my dead brother Hugh has here in his will laid out yere whole life for the three years of the minority.

He has put on me the thankless labor and care of watching over yere worldly gear, and of keeping ye safely to the lines of prudence and of a just economy.

And my duty to my dead brother, I will do just as his own words and hand and seal lay it down! To-morrow I will have much to say to you.

If ye will come back to me here, Madame Delande, when my ward goes to her own room, I'll see ye at once on a brief matter o' business.

And now I'll wait till ye take her away!" It was a half hour before Justine Delande descended to the rooms where the old egoist chafed at the loss of time stolen from the maundering researches on Thibet and the Ten Tribes.
"Woman! woman! I sent up for ye twice!" he barked, as the half-defiant Swiss governess at length joined him.
"I know my duty to my dear child, Nadine!" said the stout-hearted governess, with a crimsoning cheek.