doctor to whom she had been
recommended in Florence; but he had taken the visit in very bad part,
had told the gentleman that he had no need for any medical services,
and had been furious with her, because of her offence in having sent
such a visitor. He had told her that if ever she ventured to take
such a liberty again, he would demand the child back, and refuse her
permission inside the gates of Casalunga. "Don't come, at any rate,
till I send for you," Mrs. Trevelyan said in her last letter to her
sister. "Your being here would do no good, and would, I think, make
him feel that he was being watched. My hope is, at last, to get him
to return with me. If you were here, I think this would be less
likely. And then why should you be mixed up with such unutterable
sadness and distress more than is essentially necessary? My health
stands wonderfully well, though the heat here is very great. It is
cooler at Casalunga than in the town,--of which I am glad for his
sake. He perspires so profusely that it seems to me he cannot stand
the waste much longer. I know he will not go to England as long as
papa is there;--but I hope that he may be induced to do so by slow
stages as soon as he knows that papa has gone. Mind you send me a
newspaper, so that he may see it stated in print that papa has
sailed."

It followed as one consequence of these letters from Florence that
Nora was debarred from the Italian scheme as a mode of passing her
time till some house should be open for her reception. She had
suggested to Hugh that she might go for a few weeks to Nuncombe
Putney, but he had explained to her the nature of his mother's
cottage, and had told her that there was no hole there in which she
could lay her head. "There never was such a forlorn young woman,"
she said. "When papa goes I shall literally be without shelter."
There had come a letter from Mrs. Glascock,--at least it was signed
Caroline Glascock, though another name might have been used,--dated
from Milan, saying that they were hurrying back to Naples even at
that season of the year, because Lord Peterborough was dead. "And
she is Lady Peterborough!" said Lady Rowley, unable to repress the
expression of the old regrets. "Of course she is Lady Peterborough,
mamma; what else should she be?--though she does not so sign
herself." "We think," said the American peeress, "that we shall be
at Monkhams before the end of August, and Charles says that you are
to come just the same. Th