in my bones, mother,
there'll be ructions."

"Arthur" was Doctor Smythe, a man not very young, whom Elinor Home-Davis
had known for some time; but it was only lately that she had begun to
hope he might ask her to marry him. She valued him, for he was the one
man she had ever succeeded in attracting seriously, and though she knew
he would not think of proposing if she had not some money which would be
helpful in his career, she was eager to accept him. Had she realized
sooner that there was a chance with Arthur Smythe, she would not have
let her mother make that promise concerning Italy, for she could not be
left alone in London all winter. Arthur Smythe would think that too
strange; yet now she would not go out of England for anything. He was in
Paris attending a medical congress, and planned afterward to visit the
chateaux country with a friend; but he would be back in two or three
weeks. Now that Elinor had seen Mary, she felt that changes must be made
quickly. In other circumstances, it would have been pleasant to loiter
about Italy, stopping at the best hotels at Mary's expense, on money
that ought to have been the Home-Davises; but as it was, Elinor could
think of nothing better to do than to send Mary off by herself, in a
hurry. Or, as Mrs. Home-Davis said, "some one suitable" might be
travelling at the right time, and they could perhaps find an excuse for
stopping at home themselves.

"You can be ill, if necessary," suggested Elinor.

"Yes, I can be ill, if necessary--or you can," replied her mother.

Mary had not known that there could be such noise in the world as the
noise of London. She did not sleep that night; and the fog was blacker
than ever in the morning. Shopping had to be put off for three days; and
then Lady MacMillan was too near-sighted and too absent-minded to be of
much use. She was telegraphed for from her box of a castle, at the end
of the week, because her housekeeper was ailing--an old woman who was
almost as much friend as servant. Mary would have given anything to
return with her, even if to go back must mean retiring into the convent
forever; but the gate of the past had gently shut behind her. She could
not knock upon it for admittance, at least not until she had walked
farther along the path of the future.

When Lady MacMillan had gone, Mrs. Home-Davis and Elinor showed no
interest in the convent cousin. They went about their own concerns as if
she did not exist, leaving her to go