Gerald had come back considerably improved in health and spirits by his Canadian and Hudson’s Bay adventures. He had crossed the Turtle Mountain, and the arid plains beyond, and from the crest of one of the Sweet Grass Hills had seen the rugged and snowy outline of the Rockies, standing out in full relief against the western sky-line. He had shot a bear or two, and had some experience of wolves. He had eaten pemmican, and ridden a woolly horse; he had slept at a Hudson’s Bay station, and had passed a night or two, half-frozen and wholly awake, under canvas. Variety and adventure had done him good physically and mentally; and he told himself that of that fever which had tormented him when he left England—a fever of foolish longings and fond regrets, idle thoughts of things that might have been—he was cured wholly. Yet who shall say whether time might not show some resemblance between this cure and that of a dangerous lunatic, who is discharged from Bedlam a sane man, and who cuts his mother’s head off with a carving-knife a fortnight after his release? The double wedding was to take place in October. Nothing could induce Sir Vernon to consent to an earlier date. ‘I shall lose my darling soon enough,’ he said, ignoring Daphne in his calculations of loss. ‘Let me keep her till the end of the summer. Let us spend this one summer together. Who knows that it may not be my last?’ Any wish expressed by her father would have governed Madoline’s conduct, and this wish, expressed so stringently, could not be disregarded. Sir Vernon was frequently ailing, in a languid half-hearted way, which looked like hypochondriasis, but might be actual disease, and a part of that organic evil which was never clearly described. His doctor recommended an entire change of scene—Switzerland, the Engadine, if he could make up his mind to travel so far, and to be satisfied with the simpler diet and accommodation of that skyey world. There was a good deal of discussion, and it was ultimately settled that Sir Vernon and his daughters should start for Switzerland at the end of June, and move quietly about there, studying the invalid’s pleasure in all things. Sir Vernon set his face against the Engadine, preferring the more civilised shores of Lake Leman, which he knew by heart. Daphne had never been beyond Fontainebleau, and was enraptured at the idea of seeing snow-clad mountains and strange people. Gerald and Edgar were to be of the party, and they were only to return to England in time for the double wedding. The sisters were to be married on the same day, after all. That had been settled for them arbitrarily by family and friends, despite Daphne’s objection; and Warwickshire people were already beginning to speculate upon the details of the ceremony, and to wonder what dean or bishop would be privileged to tie the knot, assisted by the Rev. Marmaduke Ferrers.