"Then he would tell the Storys interesting things out of his long-ago, describing Count D'Orsay and Lady Blessington, with Disraeli sitting silently watching their conversation, as if it were a display of fireworks. He was always courteous and kind—a polished gentleman of the old school. At last Browning arranged for him to go to a lodging of his own, but he went to spend their little girl's birthday with the Storys. He walked to their villa along the dusty road in his old coat, but when he came in, he unbuttoned it, and with one of his old volleys of laughter showed a flowered waistcoat, very grand, which 'D'Orsay and he had ordered together,' and which he had put on in honour of the occasion.
"After he was living in Florence, Mrs. Browning told him one day that she had just got Lord Lytton's new book 'Lucile.'—'Oh, God bless my soul!' he said, 'do lend it to me.' In an hour he sent it back. 'Who could ever read a poem which began with But?' However, he was afterwards persuaded to read it, and shouted, as he generally did over what pleased him, 'Why, God bless my soul, it's the finest thing I ever read in my life.'
"Mrs. Browning did not think he was properly looked after at Florence, and sent her excellent maid, Wilson, to care for him. But it did not answer. Wilson cooked him a most excellent little dinner, and when he saw it on the table, he threw it all out of the window; it was too English, he said."
In returning north from Italy, we made an excursion to Courmayeur, driving in a tiny carriage from Ivrea along the lovely Val d'Aosta, and lingering to sketch at all the beautiful points. In France we had an especially happy day at Tonnerre, a thoroughly charming old town, where the people were employed in gathering the delicious lime-flowers which lined the boulevards, for drying to make tisanes.
There was a subject of painful interest to us during this summer, which it is difficult to explain in a few words. My sister's letter mentions how, when Italima was dying, there was one thing which she tried over and over again to say to the Dowager Lady Lothian, who was with her, and which Lady Lothian and the other bystanders vainly endeavoured to understand. It began with "Esmeralda" and ended with "her," but the intermediate words were lost. We naturally explained it to mean "Esmeralda will be very desolate when I am gone; you will look after her."
After Italima's death, Esmeralda had moved from Bryanston Street to a house in Duke Street, Manchester Square, which was kept by Mrs. Thorpe, the faithful and devoted maid of Italima's old friend Mrs. Chambers. Here my sister had every comfort, and might have had rest, but one day her brother William came to visit her, and broke a blood-vessel while he was in the house. His wife was sent for, and for several weeks he hovered between life and death; indeed, he never really recovered from this attack, though he was able to be moved in a month and lived for more than three years. The fatigue of her brother's illness entirely prostrated Esmeralda, who was already terribly shaken in health by the fatigue of the strange watchings, enjoined by Catholicism, which followed her mother's death.
It was about August that I received a letter from my Aunt Eleanor Paul begging me to come to London immediately, for something most extraordinary and trying had happened. When I went, I found my sister looking terribly ill, and my aunt greatly agitated. My aunt said that two days before Mrs. Beckwith had been to visit my sister; that, supposing she was come to talk of Catholic matters, she had not paid any especial attention to what they were saying, and, owing to her deafness, she consequently heard nothing. That she was suddenly startled by a scream from my sister, and looking up, saw her standing greatly excited, and Mrs. Beckwith trying to soothe her; that she still supposed it was some Catholic news which had agitated my sister, and that consequently she made no inquiries.
The next day, Esmeralda went out to drive with Mrs. Beckwith, and when she came back she looked dreadfully harassed and altered, so much so that at last my aunt said, "Now, Esmeralda, I am quite sure something has happened. I stand in the place of a mother to you now, and I insist upon knowing what it is."
Then my sister said that Mrs. Beckwith had startled her the day before by saying that, as she had been walking down Brook Street, Madame de Trafford had suddenly appeared before her, and, looking back upon all the events connected with the past appearances of Madame de Trafford, the news was naturally a shock to her. After driving with Mrs. Beckwith, she had returned with her to her hotel, and while she was there the door suddenly opened, and Madame de Trafford came in.