ver
was left of family property was gone as far as any inheritance on
the part of the elder son was concerned. He had himself assisted in
making over to a second brother all right that he possessed in the
property belonging to the family. Then tidings of horror accumulated
itself upon her and her baby. Then came tidings that her husband had
been already married when he first met her,--which tidings did not
reach her till he had left her alone, somewhere up among the Lakes,
for an intended absence of three days. After that day she never saw
him again. The next she heard of him was from Italy, from whence he
wrote to her to tell her that she was an angel, and that he, devil
as he was, was not fit to appear in her presence. Other things had
occurred during the fifteen months in which they had lived together
to make her believe at any rate the truth of this last statement.
It was not that she ceased to love him, but that she knew that he
was not fit to be loved. When a woman is bad a man can generally get
quit of her from his heartstrings;--but a woman has no such remedy.
She can continue to love the dishonoured one without dishonour to
herself,--and does so.

Among other misfortunes was the loss of all her money. There she was,
in the little villa on the side of the lake, with no income,--and
with statements floating about her that she had not, and never had
had, a husband. It might well be that after that she should caution
Marion Fay as to the imprudence of an exalted marriage. But there
came to her assistance, if not friendship and love, in the midst
of her misfortunes. Her brother-in-law,--if she had a husband or
a brother-in-law,--came to her from the old Duke with terms of
surrender; and there came also a man of business, a lawyer, from
Venice, to make good the terms if they should be accepted. Though
money was very scarce with the family, or the power of raising money,
still such was the feeling of the old nobleman in her misfortunes
that the entire sum which had been given up to his eldest son should
be restored to trustees for her use and for the benefit of her baby,
on condition that she should leave Italy, and consent to drop the
title of the Di Crinola family. As to that question of a former
marriage, the old lawyer declared that he was unable to give any
certain information. The reprobate had no doubt gone through some
form of a ceremony with a girl of low birth at Venice. It very
probably was not a marriage