By bad luck, my dear, it was the very morning this letter came, K. I. had got us all ordered away! What was to be done, was now the question; we daren't trust him with the secret till she was in the house, for we knew well he 'd refuse to ask her,--say he could n't afford the expense, and that we were all sworn to ruin him. We left it to Lord George to manage; and he, at last, got K. I. to fix on Parma for a week or two, one of the quietest towns in Italy, and where you never see a coach in the streets, nor even a well-dressed creature oat on Sunday. K. I. was delighted with it all; saving money is the soul of him, and he never thinks of anything but when he can make a hard bargain. What he does with his income, Molly, the saints alone can tell; but I suspect that there's some sinners, too, know a trifle about it; and the day will come when I 'll have the proof! Lord G. sent for the landlord's tariff, and it was reasonable enough. Rooms were to be two zwanzigers--one-and-fourpence--apiece; breakfast, one; dinner, two zwanzigers; tea, half a one; no charge for wine of the place; and if we stayed any time, we were to have the key of a box at the opera. K. I. was in ecstasy. "If I was to live here five or six years," says he, "and pay nobody, my affairs wouldn't be so much embarrassed as they are now!" "If you 'd cut off your encumbrances, Mr. Dodd," says I, "that would save something." "My what?" said he, flaring up, with a face like a turkey-cock. But I was n't going to dispute with him, Molly; so I swept out of the room, and threw down a little china flowerpot just to stop him. The same day we started, and arrived here at the hotel, the "Cour de Parme," by midnight; it was a tiresome journey, and K. I. made it worse, for he was fighting with somebody or other the whole time; and Lord George was not with us, for he had gone off to Milan to meet James; and Mr. D. was therefore free to get into as many scrapes as he pleased. I must say, he did n't neglect the opportunity, for he insulted the passport people and the customhouse officers, and the man at the bridge of boats, and the postmasters and postilions everywhere. "I did n't come here to be robbed," said he everywhere; and he got a few Italian words for "thief," "rogue," "villain," and so on; and if I saw one, I saw ten knives drawn on him that blessed day. He would n't let Cary translate for him, but sat on the box himself, and screamed out his directions like a madman. This went on till we came to a place called San Donino, and there--it was the last stage from Parma--they told him he could n't have any horses, though he saw ten of them standing all ready harnessed and saddled in the stable. I suppose they explained to him the reason, and that he did n't understand it, for they all got to words together, and it was soon who 'd scream loudest amongst them.