Louis Trudaine was a remarkably handsome man.

His expression was singularly kind and gentle; his manner irresistibly winning in its frank, manly firmness and composure.

His words, when he occasionally spoke, seemed as unlikely to give offense as his looks; for he only opened his lips in courteous reply to questions directly addressed to him.

Judging by a latent mournfulness in the tones of his voice, and by the sorrowful tenderness which clouded his kind, earnest eyes whenever they rested on his sister, his thoughts were certainly not of the happy or the hopeful kind.

But he gave them no direct expression; he intruded his secret sadness, whatever it might be, on no one of his companions.