For more than a month they remained in Cadiz, recruiting themselves after the toils of their voyage; and then they went to Seville, to see if they should obtain payment of the ten thousand crowns upon the French merchant’s bill.  Two days after their arrival they called upon the person on whom it was drawn.  He acknowledged it, but said that, until the arrival of advices from Paris, he could not pay the money.  Isabella’s father hired a large house facing St. Paul’s, because there was in that holy convent a nun who was remarkable for rare musical talents, and who was his own niece.  They chose the house to be near her for that reason, and because Isabella had told Richard that if he came to look for her he would find her in Seville, and her cousin, the nun of St. Paula’s, would tell him where:  he had only to ask for the nun who had the best voice in the convent; every one would know her by that description.

It was forty days more before the advices came from Paris, and two days after their arrival the French merchant paid Isabella the ten thousand crowns, which she handed over to her parents.  With that sum, and something more made by the sale of part of Isabella’s numerous jewels, her father again began business as a merchant, to the surprise of those who were cognisant of his great losses.  After a few months his lost credit began to return; so, too, did his daughter’s good looks, so that, whenever female beauty was the subject of discourse, the palm was universally conceded to the Spanish-English lady; for by that name, as well as for her great beauty, she was known throughout the city.  Through the French merchant of Seville, Isabella and her parents wrote to the queen of England, announcing their arrival in such grateful and dutiful terms as the many favours received at her Majesty’s hands required.  They also wrote to Clotald and Catherine, whom Isabella addressed as her revered parents.

Their letters to the queen remained unanswered, but from Clotald and his wife they received a reply, congratulating them on their safe arrival, and informing them that their son Richard had set out from France the day after their departure, and thence to other countries, which it behoved him to visit for the tranquillity of his conscience.  Isabella immediately concluded that Richard had left England for no other purpose than to seek her; and cheered by this hope, she was as happy as she could be, and strove to live in such a manner that, when Richard arrived in Seville, the fame of her virtues should reach his ears before he learned where she lived.

She seldom or never quitted the house, except to go to the convent, and attended no other church services than those performed there.  She never went near the river, or to Triana, or witnessed the general rejoicings at the Campo de Tablada, or the Puerta de Xeres on Sari Sebastian’s day, celebrated by an almost innumerable multitude; in short, she never went abroad for any kind of amusement in Seville; her whole time