“My undeceived soul sickened at him and at myself!
“My very last attack of homesickness found us at Geneva, where we had an elegant suit of apartments in the Hotel Beau Rivage.
“Again in one day I wrote five letters to absent friends—to my father, to Miss Murray, to Madame de la Champe, to Dr. Alexander, and to the Rev. Mr. Clement. From some of these I should surely get an answer. But week after week passed and no answer came to me.
“In the second month after our arrival at Geneva, Saviola was suddenly called to Paris—on imperative business, he said; but I had learned to distrust. I could not accompany him—my state of health utterly precluded the idea of my traveling. He took a very affectionate leave of me, and promised to be back again in a few days.
“‘A few days’ is a vague term! Yet I was not disturbed by that. He left me, and I never saw his face again.
“Just one week after he went away my child was born—a boy. I was very healthy, and had a rapid convalescence, notwithstanding the suspense and anxiety I was suffering on account of my father.
“I wrote to Luigi—to the address he had given me—and informed him of the event. But I received no reply to my letter. Yet, I got better every day, and I took great comfort and delight in my child. Also, I daily expected the return of Saviola to answer my letter in person—for I remembered that he hated to write, and was therefore one of the very worst correspondents in the world.
“But I was disappointed. Day followed day, week succeeded week, and I neither saw nor heard from Saviola, nor received any answers to any letter written to my father and friends.
“I knew that my father must long have left the archipelago, but I supposed that he must have—as usual—left orders for any letters that might come for him after his departure to be forwarded to his new address; so, though I had expected delay, I had not anticipated final disappointment.
“It was now the first of October, and many tourists were leaving the lake. Saviola had left me amply provided with funds, so that I had no fear of embarrassment, especially as I was very economical, only applying the ill-gotten money to my barest necessities. Besides, I had my boy, so that I was able to wait quite cheerfully the return of my husband.