where she might be now staying, but the letters, by agreement, were addressed to Gregg’s Hotel.  It was suggested that lodgings, or, if possible, a small furnished house, should be taken in the neighbourhood of Mortlake, Richmond, or Teddington, and that a telegram as well as letter should be sent to them at the Paris hotel.  As they could not travel quick, there might be time enough for them in this way to know whither they should go on their reaching London.

They stayed a day at Bologna, and then they went on again to Turin, over the mountains to Chambery, thence to Dijon, and on to Paris.  At Chambery they remained a couple of days, fancying that the air there was cool, and that the delay would be salutary to the sick man.  At Turin, finding that they wanted further assistance, they had hired a courier, and at last Trevelyan allowed himself to be carried in and out of the carriages and up and down the hotel stairs almost as though he were a child.  The delay was terribly grievous to Stanbury, and Mrs Trevelyan, perceiving this more than once, begged him to leave them, and to allow her to finish the journey with the aid of the courier.  But this he could not do.  He wrote letters to his friends at the D. R. office, explaining his position as well as he could, and suggesting that this and that able assistant should enlighten the British people on this and that subject, which would in the course of nature, as arranged at the D. R. office, have fallen into his hands.  He and Mrs Trevelyan became as brother and sister to each other on their way home as, indeed, it was natural that they should do.  Were they doing right or wrong in this journey that they were taking?  They could not conceal from themselves that the labour was almost more than the poor wretch could endure; and that it might be, as he himself had suggested, that they would be called on to bury him on the road.  But that residence at Casalunga had been so terrible, the circumstances of it, including the solitude, sickness, madness, and habits of life of the wretched hermit, had been so dangerous, the probability of interference on the part of some native authority so great, and the chance of the house being left in Trevelyan’s possession so small, that it had seemed to him that they had no other alternative; and yet, how would it be if they were killing him by the toil of travelling?  From Chambery, they made the journey to Paris in two days, and during that time Trevelyan hardly opened his mouth.  He slept much, and ate better than he had done in the hotter climate on the other side of the Alps.

They found a telegram at Paris, which simply contained the promise of a letter for the next day.  It had been sent by Nora, before she had gone out on her search.  But it contained one morsel of strange information; ‘Lady Milborough is going with me.’  On the next day they got a letter, saying that a cottage had been taken, furnished, between Richmond and Twickenham.  Lady Milborough had known of the cottage, and everything would be ready then.  Nora would herself meet them at the station in London, if they would, as she proposed, stay a night at Dover.  They were to address to her at Lady Milborough’s house, in Eccleston Square.  In that case, she would have a carriage for them at the Victoria Station, and would go down with them at once to the cottage.