"
"Fancy! Didn't I see her herself standing on the balcony looking down.
I was concealed by the shadow of a fountain, and she couldn't see me.
She turned her face, and I saw it in that soft, sweet, gentle beauty
which she has cultivated so wonderfully. I swear it seemed like the
face of an angel, and I could have worshiped it. If she could have
seen my face in that thick shadow she would have thought I was an
adorer of hers, like the Italian--ha, ha!--instead of a pursuer, and
an enemy."
"Well, I'll be hanged if I can tell myself which you are, old boy;
but, at any rate, I'm glad to be able to state that your trouble will
soon be over."
"How's that?"
"She's going away."
"Going away!"
"Yes."
"She! going away! where?"
"Back to England."
"Back to England! why, she's just come here. What's that for?"
"I don't know. I only know they're all going home. Well, you know,
holy week's over, and there is no object for them to stay longer."
"Going away! going away!" replied Dacres, slowly. "Who told you?"
"Miss Fay."
"Oh, I don't believe it."
"There's no doubt about it, my dear boy. Miss Fay told me explicitly.
She said they were going in a carriage by the way of Civita
Castellana."
"What are they going that way for? What nonsense! I don't believe it."
"Oh, it's a fact. Besides, they evidently don't want it to be known."
"What's that?" asked Dacres, eagerly.
"I say they don't seem to want it to be known. Miss Fay told me in her
childish way, and I saw that Mrs.
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