under by loud shouts, and looking up the road saw one cracking his
whip and waving his reins and driving two horses furiously, and behind
him there appeared the swaying figure of a woman, holding star-fish
fashion on to anything she could touch. It was Miss Abbott, who had just
received his letter from Milan announcing the time of his arrival, and
had hurried down to meet him.

He had known Miss Abbott for years, and had never had much opinion about
her one way or the other. She was good, quiet, dull, and amiable,
and young only because she was twenty-three: there was nothing in her
appearance or manner to suggest the fire of youth. All her life had
been spent at Sawston with a dull and amiable father, and her pleasant,
pallid face, bent on some respectable charity, was a familiar object
of the Sawston streets. Why she had ever wished to leave them was
surprising; but as she truly said, "I am John Bull to the backbone, yet
I do want to see Italy, just once. Everybody says it is marvellous, and
that one gets no idea of it from books at all." The curate suggested
that a year was a long time; and Miss Abbott, with decorous playfulness,
answered him, "Oh, but you must let me have my fling! I promise to have
it once, and once only. It will give me things to think about and talk
about for the rest of my life." The curate had consented; so had Mr.
Abbott. And here she was in a legno, solitary, dusty, frightened, with
as much to answer and to answer for as the most dashing adventuress
could desire.

They shook hands without speaking. She made room for Philip and his
luggage amidst the loud indignation of the unsuccessful driver, whom it
required the combined eloquence of the station-master and the station
beggar to confute. The silence was prolonged until they started. For
three days he had been considering what he should do, and still more
what he should say. He had invented a dozen imaginary conversations, in
all of which his logic and eloquence procured him certain victory. But
how to begin? He was in the enemy's country, and everything--the hot
sun, the cold air behind the heat, the endless rows of olive-trees,
regular yet mysterious--seemed hostile to the placid atmosphere of
Sawston in which his thoughts took birth. At the outset he made one
great concession. If the match was really suitable, and Lilia were bent
on it, he would give in, and trust to his influence with his mother to
set things right. He would not have mad