ing through a locked grate into a tiny
garden where were two graves only--a verdant little spot over which the
roses hung in clouds of beauty and fragrance. An inscription on a slab
sunk in the wall stated that this piece of ground was given for a
burial-place to his country-people by an Englishman who had there buried
his only son. The other denizen of the narrow plat was Dorothea Fairfax,
at whose head and feet were white marble stones, the sculpture on them
as distinct as yesterday. Bessie turned away with tears in her eyes.

"What is it?" said my lady sharply, and peered through the grate. Harry
Musgrave had walked on. When Lady Latimer looked round her face was
stern and cold, and the pleasant light had gone out of it. Without
meeting Elizabeth's glance she spoke: "The dead are always in the right;
the living always in the wrong. I had forgotten it was at Bellagio that
Dorothy died. Has Oliver seen it, I wonder? I must tell him." Yes,
Oliver had been there with his other sisters in the morning: they had
not forgotten, but they hoped that dear Olympia's steps would not wander
round by that way.

However, my lady made no further sign except by her unwonted silence.
She left the Villa Giulia the following day with all her party, her last
words to Elizabeth being, "You will let me know when you are coming to
England, and I will be at Fairfield. I would not miss seeing you: it
seems to me that we belong to one another in some fashion. Good-bye."

Bessie went back to Harry over his work rather saddened. "I do love Lady
Latimer, Harry--her very faults and her foibles," she said. "I must have
it by inheritance."

"If you had expressed a wish, perhaps she would not have gone so
suddenly. She appears to have no object in life but to serve other
people even while she rules them. Don't look so melancholy: she is not
unhappy--she is not to be pitied."

"Oh, Harry! Not unhappy, and so lonely!"

"My dear child, all the world is lonely more or less--she more, we less.
But doing all the good she can--and so much good--she must have many
hours of pure and high satisfaction. I am glad we have met."

And Bessie was glad. These chance meetings so far away gave her sweet
intervals of reverie about friends at home. She kept her tender heart
for them, but had never a regret that she had left them all for Harry
Musgrave's sake. She sat musing with lovely pensive face. Harry looked
up from his work again. The sky was heavenly serene,