Poverty demanding such privation as this excites all the greater compassion among the Swiss, because it deprives them of a chance of profit.  The cook of the establishment fed the three English boarders for a hundred francs a month inclusive.  In Gersau it was generally believed, however, that the gardener and his wife, in spite of their pretensions, used the cook’s name as a screen to net the little profits of this bargain.  The Bergmanns had made beautiful gardens round their house, and had built a hothouse.  The flowers, the fruit, and the botanical rarities of this spot were what had induced the young lady to settle on it as she passed through Gersau.  Miss Fanny was said to be nineteen years old; she was the old man’s youngest child, and the object of his adulation.  About two months ago she had hired a piano from Lucerne, for she seemed to be crazy about music.

“She loves flowers and music, and she is unmarried!” thought Rodolphe; “what good luck!”

The next day Rodolphe went to ask leave to visit the hothouses and gardens, which were beginning to be somewhat famous.  The permission was not immediately granted.  The retired gardeners asked, strangely enough, to see Rodolphe’s passport; it was sent to them at once.  The paper was not returned to him till next morning, by the hands of the cook, who expressed her master’s pleasure in showing him their place.  Rodolphe went to the Bergmanns’, not without a certain trepidation, known only to persons of strong feelings, who go through as much passion in a moment as some men experience in a whole lifetime.

After dressing himself carefully to gratify the old gardeners of the Borromean Islands, whom he regarded as the warders of his treasure, he went all over the grounds, looking at the house now and again, but with much caution; the old couple treated him with evident distrust.  But his attention was soon attracted by the little English deaf-mute, in whom his discernment, though young as yet, enabled him to recognize a girl of African, or at least of Sicilian, origin.  The child had the golden-brown color of a Havana cigar, eyes of fire, Armenian eyelids with lashes of very un-British length, hair blacker than black; and under this almost olive skin, sinews of extraordinary strength and feverish alertness.  She looked at Rodolphe with amazing curiosity and effrontery, watching his every movement.

“To whom does that little Moresco belong?” he asked worthy Madame Bergmann.

“To the English,” Monsieur Bergmann replied.

“But she never was born in England!”

“They may have brought her from the Indies,” said Madame Bergmann.

“I have been told that Miss Lovelace is fond of music.  I should be delighted if, during my residence by the lake to which I am condemned by my doctor’s orders, she would allow me to join her.”

“They receive no one, and will not see anybody,” said the old gardener.