nd late dinner
Gregorio was hardly ever to be found. No doubt he knew the way to
Monte Carlo well enough, and perhaps preferred that the family should
be farther off, for he soon ceased to show himself discontented with
their present abode. Once when his absence was inconvenient, Mr.
Egremont abused him roundly as a good-for-nothing gambler, but when
Alice hoped that he might be called to a reckoning, the wrath had
subsided with the immediate vexation, and as usual she was told 'All
those fellows were alike.'

The foreign servants were not to be induced to give the early-rising
ladies more than a roll and cup of coffee, and Nuttie felt ravenous
till she learned to lay in a stock of biscuits, and, with Martin's
connivance, made tea on her own account, and sustained her mother for
the morning's walk before the summons to Mr. Egremont.

He always wanted his wife much earlier in the day, during his hours of
deshabille, and letting her write his letters and read the papers to
him. She was pleased with this advance, but it gave Nuttie a great
deal more solitude, which was sometimes judiciously spent, but it was
very hard not to be desultory in spite of learning lessons in French,
Italian, and drawing.

Later in the day came the drive or the visit to the public gardens when
the band was playing, but this became less frequent as Mr. Egremont
observed the cold civility shown to his wife, and as he likewise grew
stronger and made more engagements of his own. Then Nuttie had happy
afternoons of driving, donkey-riding, or walking with her mother,
sketching, botanising, admiring, and laying up stores for the long
descriptive letters that delighted the party in St. Ambrose's Road,
drinking in all the charm of the scenery, and entering into it
intelligently. They spent a good many evenings alone together
likewise, and it could not but give Alice a pang to see the gladness
her daughter did not repress when this was the case, even though to
herself it meant relaxation of the perpetual vigilance she had to exert
when the father and daughter were together to avert collisions. They
were certainly not coming nearer to one another, though Nuttie was
behaving very well and submissively on the whole, and seldom showing
symptoms of rebellion. This went on through the early part of their
stay, but latterly there was a growing sense upon the girl that she and
her mother were avoided by some young ladies to whom they had been
introduced