members
and loves you always, as her dear cousin--her dear, dear brother."

The letter ended unconventionally, without a signature; but the writing
of the last lines was strong and bold, with a vigorous upward curve.

With a touch of impetuosity, Clodagh picked up an envelope and
addressed it to Laurence Asshlin at Orristown; then, rising from the
bureau, she rang a bell.

An Italian man-servant responded to the summons--the same man-servant
who had waited at breakfast on the morning that Milbanke had received
Barnard's summons to Venice. Entering the room with sympathetic
deference, he paused just inside the door.

"Signora!" he murmured.

Clodagh turned to him, the black-edged envelope in her hand.

"Tell Simonetta to bring me my hat and cloak," she said. "I'm going
down into Florence--to post a letter." And without waiting to see what
expression her declaration brought to the man's face, she crossed the
room and stood once more in the flood of clear, cool sunlight that
poured through the open window.

CHAPTER II

Exactly one week later Clodagh arrived in Paris on her way to England.
Simonetta Ottolenghi--an Italian woman, who had been in her service as
maid for nearly four years--was her only companion; there was no friend
to meet or welcome her in the unfamiliar city, and even the dog
Mick--the companion of so many solitary hours--had been left behind in
Florence until she could conveniently send for him; yet, incongruous as
it may sound, her feelings were happy--her mind was free from
loneliness as her train steamed into the crowded railway station and
she found herself free to drive to her hotel. After all, life
undeniably stretched before her, and there was no prohibition against
letting her eyes dwell upon the vistas it opened up!

Knowledge of duty done--be the doing ever so tardy--is the best
stimulus for the wayfarer in the world's by-ways; and Clodagh, as she
stepped from her train on that February afternoon, was conscious of
some such reassuring certainty.

In the last two years, life for her had been a thing of physical
inaction, accompanied by a subtle process of mental development. The
night of tempestuous excitement--when, in a whirl of pain, chagrin, and
passionate self-contempt, she had repudiated Venice and her newly made
friends--had been the birth of a fresh phase in her existence. With all
the ardour, all the enthusiasm, whereof her vivid nature was capable,
she had veered