As it happened, Dorothy's hat and pretty velvet jacket, trimmed with lovely soft fur, were kept in a little closet, with a window in it, behind the schoolroom. They were put there when she came to the Villa Lucia every morning by Ingleby, who never failed to send her in to see Lady Burnside, drawing secret comparisons between the appearance of her darling and that of Miss Packingham or little Miss Ella Montague.
Dorothy had some difficulty in getting herself into her jacket, and her hair notched into the elastic of her hat, which, springing back, caught her in the eyes, and made them water. Then, when she thought she was ready, she remembered she had not taken off the apron which was stained with the little crimson spot. A little rim of white showed under the jacket between the fur and the edge of her frock, but she pushed it up under the band, and then went softly down the hall to the glass door, and lifting the portière, or thick curtain, which hung over the outer door, she found herself in the road. For the Villa Lucia did not open into the garden which lay between the Villa and sloping ground and the blue sea, but from the back, into a road which led towards the old town of San Remo.
Dorothy held the letter firmly in her hand, and walked on with some dignity. It was rather nice to go to the post by herself, and she measured the distance in her own mind, as she had often been there with Ingleby and Crawley.
The shop where the New Year's cards were sold was near the post-office, and she had two shillings in her little leather purse at the bottom of her pocket.
Several Italian women, carrying heavy burdens on their heads, passed her and smiled, and said in a pleasant voice, "Buon gionno!" and one young woman, with a patient baby tightly swathed and fastened to her back, called out,—
"Ah, la piccola bella!"
Somehow Dorothy was so lost in meditation upon herself and her own cleverness in finding the way to the post, that she missed the first turning which would have led her down to the English part of the town. She took the next, but that brought her out beyond the shops and the post-office.
She did not at first notice this, and when she found she was much farther from home than she expected, she began to run, but still she did not get any nearer the shops and the post-office. Now the street of the English part of San Remo runs almost parallel with the sea, and there are several narrow lanes between the houses, which lead down to the quay, where all the boats sail from the pier, and where a great many women are mending the holes in the brown nets.
There are streets also leading up to the old town—that quaint old town, which was built on the steep sides of the hill, long, long before any English people thought of erecting their new houses and villas below it.
The streets of the old town are so steep that they are climbed by steps, or rather ridges, of pavement, which are set at rather long intervals. These streets are very narrow, and there are arches across them, like little bridges, from one house to another.