"Father, what do you think has happened?" I explained. "I have met some English friends in Palermo." "Who are they?" he asked nervously. "Lord Parkhurst and his daughter. Lady Olive is a friend of Miss Devereux's, and a very jolly little girl she is." My father nodded. "Glad you've been enjoying yourself," he remarked. "I hope they are going to stay for a time. They'll be company for you." "And you too, father," I added quickly. "Lord Parkhurst wants to call and see you. He knows all about us, and he seems very anxious to make your acquaintance. Do you mind?" My father considered for some time before he answered. I could see that the idea half pleased him, although he could not quite make up his mind to break through his old habit. "I don't think I should mind much, Hugh," he said at last. "But there's no one else, is there?" "Only a son, and two daughters. Lady Olive is quite as anxious to know you as her father. Oh! and there's a fellow called Burton Leigh." "Burton Leigh!" repeated my father. "Burton Leigh! There is no man whom I should like to meet more if it's the same Burton Leigh who wrote this treatise on Modern Mahometanism." "Same fellow," I declared, without hesitation. "He looks beastly clever, and Lady Olive said that he'd lived for years in Egypt with a tribe of Arabs. Same fellow for certain." "How strange! When are they coming, Hugh?" "To-morrow," I answered, invoking secret blessings on the head of Mr. Burton Leigh. "They are coming this way to San Martino, and I was to let them know whether they might call." CHAPTER XXXV WE ENTERTAIN AT THE VILLA My father and I were sitting at breakfast on the following morning, out of doors, on the wooden balcony, when I again recurred to the visit which we were to receive. Below us stretched a wild, neglected garden, picturesque but overgrown, and further away was a flourishing vineyard and a bare stretch of heath, only redeemed from absolute ugliness by the brilliant patches of wild-flowers and frequent groups of olive-trees. Although it was early morning the warm air was already laden with the languid, almost oppressive, scent of wild hyacinths and other odorous plants, and there seemed to be every promise of a scorching hot day. As usual, our breakfast consisted almost entirely of different sorts of fruits and the wine of the country, and until we had nearly finished and my father had leaned back in his low wicker chair, with the blue smoke from a cigarette curling around him, we scarcely interchanged a word. "I wonder if there's anything in the house for lunch?" I remarked, rather abruptly. My father looked at me with a mild astonishment, for we seldom asked one another questions of that sort, leaving almost everything to our housekeeper. "I haven't the faintest idea," he acknowledged, languidly fanning himself with his hat. "Better ask Marie. Why this premature curiosity?" I shrugged my shoulders. "We may have company," I remarked.