“The _Vendetta_? Yes, she is pretty familiar with the bays and bights of the Mediterranean. No doubt he will follow us, dear. But I should like him to speak out before we go.” “Then I’m afraid you will be disappointed. He likes coming here--he likes you and Isola, and perhaps he likes me, pretty well, after a fashion; but sailors are generally fickle, are they not? And if he is at all like his brother, Lord Lostwithiel, who seems to have a dreadful reputation, judging by the way people talk of him here----” “He is not like his brother in character or disposition. If he were, I should be sorry for my sister to marry him.” “Have you such a very bad opinion of his brother?” asked Allegra, shocked and grieved that any one closely allied to John Hulbert should bear an evil repute. “Perhaps that would be too much to say. I know so little about him. I have scarcely seen him since he was a lad--only I have heard things which have prejudiced me,” continued Disney, lapsing into moody thoughtfulness. Was it not Mr. Crowther’s insolence, and that alone, which had prejudiced him against Lostwithiel--had made the very name hateful to him? Yes, that was the cause of his aversion. He had disproved those insolent insinuations; he had exploded the covert slander and rebuked the slanderer; but he had not forgotten. The wound still rankled. CHAPTER XVIII. “NO SUDDEN FANCY OF AN ARDENT BOY.” It was Christmas Eve. All things were arranged for departure on the 28th, which would give time for their arrival at San Remo on New Year’s Day. They were to travel by easy stages, by Amiens, Basle, and Lucerne. A good deal of luggage had been sent off in advance, and trunks and portmanteaux were packed ready for the start; so that the travellers could take their ease during the few days of Christmas church-going and festivity. Isola’s spirits had improved wonderfully since the journey had been decided upon. “It seems like beginning a new life, Martin,” she told her husband. “I feel ever so much better already. I’m afraid I’m an impostor, and that you are taking a great deal of unnecessary trouble on my account.” It was such a relief to think that she would see Vansittart Crowther no more, that she could wander where she pleased without the hazard of meeting that satyr-like countenance, those pale protruding eyes, with malevolent stare--such a relief to know that she would be in a new country, where no one would know anything about her, or have any inclination to gossip about her. Something of her old gaiety and interest in life revived at the prospect of those new surroundings.