The former was now in deep mourning—so deep that it was almost the same as the weeds of a widow, for she felt herself a widow in heart, indeed; and by the double loss she had endured the girl thought that Fate was very cruel to her.
She had received a pleasant, a delightfully-soothing letter from old Dr. Wodrow, condoling with her on the sad news from Cabul, all ignorant as he was yet of the escape of his son amid the new calamity in that fatal city—fatal to Britons, at least.
'Any place in which we are perfectly happy is a place we glorify and transform,' says a writer: and in the joy of her engagement to Leslie Colville, notwithstanding the perils he had to face, Mary had glorified their pretty abode by the Elbe at Altona.
That was all ended and over, and now the place had become to her one of double gloom, and associated with a double sorrow.
'Ah, Madame Deroubigne,' said the young Baron Rolandsburg, 'your charming villa has now not unnaturally become to you a place of calamitous associations—most unhomely,' he added. 'Ja-ja! it is always so after misfortunes come.'
And now as Altona had become so repugnant—a place of such horror to both Mary Wellwood and Mrs. Deroubigne, the time was fast approaching when they were to take their departure for London.
CHAPTER XII.
THE PLOT THICKENS.
Finding that his visits were fast making Ellinor seriously ill, Sir Redmond, at the request of Herr Wyburg, did not intrude upon her for a day or two, yet he called and left a sham message concerning his continued inquiries for Mrs. Deroubigne.
'Where are the friends of the Fraulein?' asked Herr Wyburg, twisting his coarse, red moustache; 'in England?'