VII.

Meanwhile, unconscious of the miracle his prayer had wrought, Cardinal Bonpre and his young charge Manuel, arrived in Paris, and drove from the station direct to a house situated near the Bois du Boulogne, where the Cardinal’s niece, Angela Sovrani, only daughter of Prince Sovrani, and herself famous throughout Europe as a painter of the highest promise, had a suite of rooms and studio, reserved for her occasional visits to the French capital.  Angela Sovrani was a rare type of her sex,—­unlike any other woman in the world, so those who knew her best were wont to declare.  Without being actually beautiful, according to the accepted lines and canons of physical perfection, she created around her an effect of beauty, which was dazzling and exciting to a singular degree,—­people who came once within the charmed circle of her influence could never forget her, and always spoke of her afterwards as a creature apart;—­a “woman of genius,—­yes!”—­they said, “But something more even than that.”  And this “something more,” was just the inexplicable part of her which governed her whole being, and rendered her so indescribably attractive.  And she was not without beauty—­or perhaps it should be termed loveliness rather,—­of an exquisitely suggestive kind, which provoked the beholder into questioning where and how the glamour of it fell.  In her eyes, perhaps, the secret lay,—­they were violet-grey in hue, and drowsy-lidded, with long lashes that swept the delicate pale cheeks in a dark golden fringe of shadow, through which the sparkle of vision gleamed,—­now warningly, now tenderly,—­ and anon, these same half-shut and deep fringed lids would open wide, letting the full brilliance of the soul behind the eyes pour forth its luminance, in flashes of such lightning-like clearness and compelling force, that it was impossible not to recognise something higher than mere woman in the dazzle of that spiritual glory.  In figure she was wonderfully slight,—­so slight indeed that she suggested a delicate willow-withe such as can be bent and curved with one hand—­yet this slightness stood her in good stead, for being united with extreme suppleness, it gave her a grace of movement resembling that of some skimming mountain bird or sea-swallow, which flies with amazing swiftness yet seeming slowness.  Angela never moved quickly,—­no one had ever seen her in what is termed a “rush,” or a vulgar hurry.  She did everything she had to do without haste, without noise, without announcement or assertion of any kind;—­and all that she did was done as perfectly as her ability could warrant.  And that ability was very great indeed, and displayed itself in small details as well as large attempts.  Whether she merely twisted her golden-brown hair into a knot, or tied a few flowers together and fastened them on her dress with a pearl pin, either thing was perfectly done—­without a false line or a discordant hue.  Her face, form, voice