A few English books lay here and there, volumes of unattractive
binding, and presenting titles little suggestive of a holiday in
Campania; works which it would be misleading to call theological;
the feeblest modern echoes of fierce old Puritans, half shame-faced
modifications of logic which, at all events, was wont to conceal no
consequence of its savage premises. More noticeable were some
architectural plans unrolled upon a settee; the uppermost
represented the elevation of a building designed for religious
purposes, painfully recognizable by all who know the conventicles of
sectarian England. On the blank space beneath the drawing were a few
comments, lightly pencilled.

Having finished and addressed some half a dozen brief letters, Mrs.
Baske brooded for several minutes before she began to write on the
next sheet of paper. It was intended for her sister-in-law, a lady
of middle age, who shared in the occupancy of Redheck House. At
length she penned the introductory formula, but again became absent,
and sat gazing at the branches of a pine-tree which stood in strong
relief against cloudless blue. A sigh, an impatient gesture, and she
went on with her task.

"It is very kind of you to be so active in attending to the things
which you know I have at heart. You say I shall find everything as I
could wish it on my return, but you cannot think what a stranger to
Bartles I already feel. It will soon be six months Since I lived my
real life there; during my illness I might as well have been absent,
then came those weeks in the Isle of Wight, and now this exile. I
feel it as exile, bitterly. To be sure Naples is beautiful, but it
does not interest me. You need not envy me the bright sky, for it