’If Madame would permit him to be included in her passport, as about to join the Ambassador’s suite, and thus conduct him to Sweden; Lady Hope would find means to communicate with him from thence, the poor young man would be saved from a ruined career, and the heart of the widow and mother would bless you for ever.

Madame de Bourke was touched, but she was a prudent woman, and paused to ask whether the youth had shown any tendency to run into temptation, from which Lady Nithsdale wished to remove him.

‘Oh no,’ she answered; ’he was a perfectly good docile lad, though high-spirited, submissive to the Earl, and a kind playfellow to her little girls; it was his very excellence that made it so unfortunate that he should thus be stranded in early youth in consequence of one boyish folly.’

The Countess began to yield.  She thought he might go as secretary to her Lord, and she owned that if he was a brave young man, he would be an addition to her little escort, which only numbered two men besides her brother-in-law, the Abbe, who was of almost as little account as his young nephew.  ‘But I should warn you, Madame,’ added Madame de Bourke, ’that it may be a very dangerous journey.  I own to you, though I would not tell my poor mother, that my heart fails me when I think of it, and were it not for the express commands of their father, I would not risk my poor children on it.’

’I do not think you will find Sweden otherwise than a cheerful and pleasant abode,’ said Lady Nithsdale.

‘Ah! if we were only in Sweden, or with my husband, all would be well!’ replied the other lady; ’but we have to pass through the mountains, and the Catalans are always ill-affected to us French.’

‘Nay; but you are a party of women, and belong to an ambassador!’ was the answer.

’What do those robbers care for that?  We are all the better prey for them!  I have heard histories of Spanish cruelty and lawlessness that would make you shudder!  You cannot guess at the dreadful presentiments that have haunted me ever since I had my husband’s letter.’

‘There is danger everywhere, dear friend,’ said Lady Nithsdale kindly; ‘but God finds a way for us through all.’

‘Ah! you have experienced it,’ said Madame de Bourke.  ’Let us proceed to the affairs.  I only thought I should tell you the truth.’

Lady Nithsdale answered for the courage of her protege, and it was further determined that he should be presented to her that evening by the Earl, at the farewell reception which Madame de Varennes was to hold on her daughter’s behalf, when it could be determined in what capacity he should be named in the passport.

Estelle, who had been listening with all her ears, and trying to find a character in Fenelon’s romance to be represented by Arthur Hope, now further heard it explained that the party were to go southward to meet her father at one of the Mediterranean ports, as the English Government were so suspicious of Jacobites that he did not venture on taking the direct route by sea, but meant to travel through Germany.  Madame de Bourke expected to meet her brother at Avignon, and to obtain his advice as to her further route.