“I suppose you will confer with Cutbill before you return an answer to Augustus?” said Temple, stiffly.
“I may—that is, I may listen to what that very plausible but not very polished individual has to say, before I frame the exact terms of my reply. We are all of us, so to say, 'dans des mauvais draps.' You are going where you hate to go, and I, who really should have had no share in this general disaster, have taken my ticket in the lottery when the last prize has just been paid over the counter.”
“It is very hard on you indeed,” said the other, scornfully.
“Nothing less than your sympathy would make it endurable;” and as he spoke he lighted a bedroom candle and moved towards the door. “Don't tell them at F. O. that you are going out unwillingly, or they'll keep you there. Trust to some irregularity when you are there, to get recalled, and be injured. If a man can only be injured and brought before the House, it's worth ten years' active service to him. The first time I was injured I was made secretary of embassy. The second gave me my K. C. B., and I look to my next misfortune for the Grand Cross. Good-bye. Don't take the yellow fever, don't marry a squaw.”
And with a graceful move of the hand he motioned an adieu, and disappeared.
CHAPTER XXX. ON THE ROAD
L'Estrange and his sister were on their way to Italy. The curate had been appointed to the church at Albano, and he was proceeding to his destination with as much happiness as is permitted to a man who, with a very humble opinion of himself, feels called on to assume a position of some importance.
Wishing, partly from motives of enjoyment, partly from economy, to avoid the route most frequented by travellers, they had taken the road through Zurich and the valley of the Upper Rhine, and had now reached the little village of Dornbirn in the Vorarlberg—a spot of singular beauty, in the midst of a completely pastoral country. High mountains, snow-capped above, pine-clad lower down, descended by grassy slopes into rich pasture-lands, traversed by innumerable streams, and dotted over with those cottages of framed wood, which, with their ornamented gables and quaint galleries, are the most picturesque peasant houses in existence. Beautiful cattle covered the hills, their tinkling bells ringing out in the clear air, and blending their tones with the ceaseless flow of falling water, imparting just that amount of sound that relieved the solemn character of the scene, and gave it vitality.
Day after day found our two travellers still lingering here. There was a charm in the spot, which each felt, without confessing it to the other, and it was already the fourth evening of their sojourn as they were sitting by the side of a little rivulet, watching the dipping flies along the stream, that Julia said suddenly,—