During Caroline's protracted illness, Willoughby had had some uncomfortable misgivings; not that he had confessed his feelings even to himself, yet he had thought that during convalescence, he might have been permitted to see a lady to whom he now considered himself betrothed. True, he had frequently been admitted, and been received very graciously by Lady Palliser; and on such occasions he had tried to feel satisfied with the excuse that Caroline had not yet been able to quit her room. He had addressed to Caroline very many and very tender _billet doux_; to all of which he had received very gracious and encouraging replies, though written by Lady Palliser, to spare, as he supposed, the invalid the fatigue of being her own amanuensis. This was all perfectly proper, yet though he told himself so again and again, he could not help feeling that some more direct communication would be much more satisfactory. So sudden a recovery as was implied by this journey, undertaken too during the few days of his absence, seemed so strange, that every painful feeling was instantly increased tenfold. Yet he knew not what to apprehend; suspense, however, becoming wholly intolerable, he resolved to set out immediately for ----shire. He did so within an hour, but without communicating any of his doubts or fears even to Alfred. As soon as Willoughby had set off, Alfred also hastened to quit Cheltenham, where every object, and every circumstance, which used formerly to yield him delight, was fraught with the most miserable associations. He went to Arden; nor could he have chosen a better retreat: for the instantaneous effect of a sight of its well-known scenes was for a time to give to the feelings and affections of childhood and boyhood a most salutary preponderance over the newer and more vivid, but far less uniformly happy sensations of the last few months. CHAPTER XIV. Lady Arden, about the same time, set out for her house in town, accompanied by Madeline, her only remaining daughter. Mrs. Dorothea, thus left alone, began to ponder on the prudential step of breaking up an establishment, which she found much too expensive for her means--more so, infinitely, than she had anticipated. For it so happened, that her maid-of-all-work cook, whom she took with the house, was one of a set, who not being sufficiently reputable to get places in private families, are frequently employed by speculators in furnished houses, to take charge of the same when vacant, living on their wits the while, and on their lodgers when they can get them. Moreover she belonged to a club for supplying servants out of place with broken meat. Poor Mrs. Dorothea, therefore, was sadly puzzled about the consumption in her kitchen. At last she ventured to consult her confidential abigail, Sarah.