But on reaching Paris he heard tidings of Mrs Arabin which induced him to change his plans and make for Venice instead of for Florence.  A banker at Paris, who whom he had brought a letter, told him that Mrs Arabin would now be found at Venice.  This did not perplex him at all.  It would have been delightful to have seen Florence—­but was more delightful still to see Venice.  His journey was the same as far as Turin; but from Turin he proceeded through Milan to Venice, instead of going to Bologna to Florence.  He had fortunately come armed with an Austrian passport—­as was necessary in those bygone days of Venice’s thraldom.  He was almost proud of himself, as though he had done something great, when he tumbled in to his inn at Venice, without having been in bed since he left London.

But he was barely allowed to swim in a gondola, for on reaching Venice he found that Mrs Arabin had gone back to Florence.  He had been directed to the hotel which Mrs Arabin had used, and was there told that she had started the day before.  She had received some letter, from her husband as the landlord thought, and had done so.  That was all the landlord knew.  Johnny was vexed, but became a little prouder than before as he felt it to be his duty to go on to Florence before he went to bed.  There would be another night in a railway carriage, but he would live through it.  There was just time to have a tub, and a breakfast, to swim in a gondola, to look at the outside of the Doge’s palace, and to walk up and down the piazza before he started again.  It was hard work, but I think he would have been pleased had he heard that Mrs Arabin had retreated from Florence to Rome.  Had such been the case, he would have folded his cloak around him, and have gone on—­regardless of brigands—­thinking of Lily, and wondering whether anybody else had ever done so much before without going to bed.  As it was, he found that Mrs Arabin was at the hotel in Florence—­still in bed, as he had arrived early in the morning.  So he had another tub, another breakfast, and sent up his card—­’Mr John Eames’—­and across the top of it he wrote, ’has come from England about Mr Crawley.’  Then he threw himself on a sofa in the hotel reading-room, and went fast to sleep.

John had found an opportunity of talking to a young lady in the breakfast-room, and had told her of his deeds.  ’I only left London on Tuesday night, and I have come here taking Venice on the road.’

‘Then you have travelled fast,’ said the young lady.

‘I haven’t seen a bed, of course,’ said John.

The young lady immediately afterwards told her father.  ’I suppose he must be one of the Foreign Office messengers,’ said the young lady.

‘Anything but that,’ said the gentleman.  ’People never talk about their own trades.  He’s probably a clerk with a fortnight’s leave of absence, seeing how many towns he can do in the time.  It’s the usual way of travelling nowadays.  When I was young and there were no railways, I remember going from Paris to Vienna without sleeping.’  Luckily for his present happiness, John did not hear this.