Altogether the old marquis was the happiest of mortals, living well, drinking high, hunting much, tolerated by the peasants, and execrated by the gentlemen of the neighborhood, who regarded him with contempt and raillery.

Time never hung heavy on his hands, except in mid-summer, when the valley of the Rhone was intensely hot; and even then he had infallible means of amusement, always new, though ever the same.

He detested, above all, his neighbor the Countess de la Verberie.

The Countess de la Verberie, the “bete noire” of the marquis, as he ungallantly termed her, was a tall, dry woman, angular in appearance and character, cold and arrogant toward her equals, and domineering over her inferiors.

Like her noble neighbor, she too had emigrated; and her husband was afterward killed at Lutzen, but unfortunately not in the French ranks.

In 1815, the countess came back to France.  But while the Marquis de Clameran returned to comparative ease, she could obtain nothing from royal munificence, but the small estate and chateau of La Verberie.

It is true that the chateau of La Verberie would have contented most people; but the countess never ceased to complain of her unmerited poverty, as she called it.

The pretty chateau was more modest in appearance than the manor of the Clamerans; but it was equally comfortable, and much better regulated by its proud mistress.

It was built in the middle of a beautiful park, one of the wonders of that part of the country.  It reached from the Beaucaire road to the river-bank, a marvel of beauty, with its superb old oaks, yoke-elms, and lovely groves, its meadow, and clear stream of water winding in among the trees.

The countess had but one child—­a lovely girl of eighteen, named Valentine; fair, slender, and graceful, with large, soft eyes, beautiful enough to make the stone saints of the village church thrill in their niches, when she knelt piously at their feet.

The renown of her great beauty, carried on the rapid waters of the Rhone, was spread far and wide.

Often the bargemen and the robust wagoners, driving their powerful horses along the road, would stop to gaze with admiration upon Valentine seated under some grand old tree on the banks of the river, absorbed in her book.

At a distance her white dress and flowing tresses made her seem a mysterious spirit from another world, these honest people said; they thought it a good omen when they caught a glimpse of her as they passed up the river.  All along between Arles and Valence she was spoken of as the “lovely fairy” of La Verberie.

If M. de Clameran detested the countess, Mme. de la Verberie execrated the marquis.  If he nicknamed her “the witch,” she never called him anything but “the old gander.”

And yet they should have agreed, for at heart they cherished the same opinions, with different ways of viewing them.