“You know mother, and can in part understand how she would scorn a girl who, though born to better things, was still found in the capacity of a waiting-maid. I never saw her so moved as she was for a time, after learning that her only living son, from whom she expected so much, had thrown himself away, as she expressed it. Sister Hatty, who loved Genevra, did all she could to heal the growing difference between us, but I trusted mother most. I believed that what she said was right, and so matters grew worse, until one night, the last we spent in Rome, I missed Genevra from our rooms, and starting in quest of her, found her, in a little flower garden back of our dwelling. There, under the deep shadow of a tree, and partly concealed from view, she stood with her arm around the neck of the same rough-looking man who had been there before. She did not see me as I watched her while she parted with him, suffering him to kiss her hand and forehead as he said, “Good-bye, my darling.” “In a tremor of anger and excitement I quitted the spot, my mind wholly made up with regard to my future. That there was something wrong about Genevra I did not doubt, and I would not give her a chance to explain by telling her what I had seen, but sent her back to England, giving her ample means for defraying the expenses of her journey and for living in comfort after her arrival there. From Rome we went to Naples, and then to Switzerland, where Hatty died, leaving us alone with little Jamie. It was at Berne that I received an anonymous letter from England, the writer stating that Genevra was with her aunt, that the whole had ended as he thought it would, that he could readily guess at the nature of the trouble, and hinting that if a _divorce_ was desirable on my return to England, all necessary proof could be obtained by applying to such a number in London, the writer announcing himself a brother of the man who had once sought Genevra, and saying he had always opposed the match, knowing Genevra’s family.