'
Agnes compassionately read the letters.
They were not written in a very tender tone. 'Dear Emily,'
and 'Yours affectionately'--these conventional phrases,
were the only phrases of endearment which they contained.
In the first letter, Lord Montbarry was not very favourably spoken
of:--'We leave Paris to-morrow. I don't much like my lord.
He is proud and cold, and, between ourselves, stingy in money matters.
I have had to dispute such trifles as a few centimes in the hotel bill;
and twice already, some sharp remarks have passed between
the newly-married couple, in consequence of her ladyship's freedom
in purchasing pretty tempting things at the shops in Paris.
"I can't afford it; you must keep to your allowance." She has had to
hear those words already. For my part, I like her. She has the nice,
easy foreign manners--she talks to me as if I was a human being
like herself.'
The second letter was dated from Rome.
'My lord's caprices' (Ferrari wrote) 'have kept us perpetually
on the move. He is becoming incurably restless. I suspect he is
uneasy in his mind. Painful recollections, I should say--I find him
constantly reading old letters, when her ladyship is not present.
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