suppose, as I should prefer, either that Mrs. Pallant hadn't known she
was writing or that they wished to make us think she hadn't known. The
letter might pass as a common civility of the girl's to a person with
whom she had been on easy terms. It was, however, for something more
than this that my nephew took it; so at least I gathered from the
touching candour of his determination to go to Baveno. I judged it idle
to drag him another way; he had money in his own pocket and was quite
capable of giving me the slip. Yet--such are the sweet incongruities of
youth--when I asked him to what tune he had been thinking of Linda since
they left us in the lurch he replied: "Oh I haven't been thinking at
all! Why should I?" This fib was accompanied by an exorbitant blush.
Since he was to obey his young woman's signal I must equally make out
where it would take him, and one splendid morning we started over the
Simplon in a post-chaise.

I represented to him successfully that it would be in much better taste
for us to alight at Stresa, which as every one knows is a resort of
tourists, also on the shore of the major lake, at about a mile's
distance from Baveno. If we stayed at the latter place we should have to
inhabit the same hotel as our friends, and this might be awkward in view
of a strained relation with them. Nothing would be easier than to go and
come between the two points, especially by the water, which would give
Archie a chance for unlimited paddling. His face lighted up at the
vision of a pair of oars; he pretended to take my plea for discretion
very seriously, and I could see that he had at once begun to calculate
opportunities for navigation with Linda. Our post-chaise--I had insisted
on easy stages and we were three days on the way--deposited us at
Stresa toward the middle of the afternoon, and it was within an
amazingly short time that I found myself in a small boat with my nephew,
who pulled us over to Baveno with vigorous strokes. I remember the