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So Nora crossed the bridge after dinner, and went up to the American Minister's palatial residence. Caroline was then in the loggia, and Mr. Glascock was with her; and for a while they talked about Emily Trevelyan and her misfortunes. Mr. Glascock was clearly of opinion that Trevelyan would soon be either in an asylum or in his grave.
She was altogether unfitted for wedding joys, and her father had promised to bear her company when the others left her. Mr. Glascock and Caroline Spalding were to be married in Florence, and were to depart immediately from thence for some of the cooler parts of Switzerland.
Glascock after what had passed between them on that night under the Campanile, he did not rebel for an instant against the order given to him.
They were with the minister, but Mr. Glascock came up and shook hands with them. "I would introduce you to my uncle, Mr. Spalding," said Olivia, "only, as it happens, we have never yet heard your name." "My name is Mr. Glascock," said he, smiling. Then the introduction was made; and the American Minister took off his hat, and was very affable.
I admit that he is always claiming to be the first; but he does so only that he may not be too evidently the last. If you knew us, Mr. Glascock, you would find us to be very mild, and humble and nice, and good, and clever, and kind, and charitable, and beautiful, in short, the finest people that have as yet been created on the broad face of God's smiling earth."
"For fear there might be mistakes, I thought it better to come myself," said Mr. Glascock. "You did not wish to see Sir Marmaduke?" "Certainly not Sir Marmaduke," said Trevelyan, with a look of anger that was almost grotesque. "And you thought it better that Mrs. Trevelyan should not come." "Yes; I thought it better; but not from any feeling of anger towards her.
Glascock knew at once that all the clothes which he saw before him had been made for Italian and not for English wear; and could almost have said that they had been bought in Siena and not in Florence. "I had not intended to impose this labour on you, Mr. Glascock," Trevelyan said, raising his cap to salute his visitor.
Glascock also was frequently in the same circles, and thus it came to pass that the two gentlemen saw each other almost daily. That Mr. Spalding knew well how to bear himself in his high place no one could doubt; but he did not quite know how to carry himself before Mr. Glascock. At home at Boston he would have been more completely master of the situation.
"There's nothing I think so grand, as walking up a mountain," he said after a while. "It's all very well," said Trevelyan, in a tone which seemed to imply that to him in his present miserable condition all recreations, exercises, and occupations were mere leather and prunella. "I don't mean, you know, in the Alpine Club way," said Glascock. "I'm too old and too stiff for that.
It seemed to her to be so natural to say a good word in praise of her niece to the man whom she believed to be in love with her niece. Caroline and Mr. Glascock did not meet each other again till late in the evening, and just as he was about to take his leave. As they came together each of them involuntarily looked round to see whether Miss Petrie was near.
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