 Duriette, composed a voyaging party up the river, of
which expedition Redworth was Lady Dunstane's chief writer of the records. His
novel perceptiveness and shrewdness of touch made them amusing; and his
tenderness to the Beauty's coquettry between the two foreign rivals, moved a
deeper feeling. The German had a guitar, the Frenchman a voice; Diana joined
them in harmony. They complained apart severally of the accompaniment and the
singer. Our English criticized them apart; and that is at any rate to occupy a
post, though it contributes nothing to entertainment. At home the Esquarts had
sung duets; Diana had assisted Redworth's manly chest-notes at the piano. Each
of them declined to be vocal. Diana sang alone for the credit of the country,
Italian and French songs, Irish also. She was in her mood of Planxty Kelly and
Garryowen all the way. »Madame est Irlandaise?« Redworth heard the Frenchman
say, and he owned to what was implied in the answering tone of the question. »We
should be dull dogs without the Irish leaven!« So Tony in exile still managed to
do something for her darling Erin. The solitary woman on her heights at Copsley
raised an exclamation of, »Oh! that those two had been or could be united!« She
was conscious of a mystic symbolism in the prayer.
    She was not apprehensive of any ominous intervention of another. Writing
from Venice, Diana mentioned Mr. Percy Dacier as being engaged to an heiress; »A
Miss Asper, niece of a mighty shipowner, Mr. Quintin Manx, Lady Esquart tells
me: money fabulous, and necessary to a younger son devoured with ambition. The
elder brother, Lord Creedmore, is a common Nimrod, always absent in Hungary,
Russia, America, hunting somewhere. Mr. Dacier will be in the Cabinet with the
next Ministry.« No more of him. A new work by ANTONIA was progressing.
    The Summer in South Tyrol passed like a royal procession before young eyes
for Diana, and at the close of it, descending the Stelvio, idling through the
Valtelline, Como Lake was reached, Diana full of her work, living the double
life of the author. At Bellagio one afternoon Mr. Percy Dacier appeared. She
remembered subsequently a disappointment she felt in not beholding Mr. Redworth
either with him or displacing him. If engaged to a lady, he was not an ardent
suitor; nor was he a pointedly complimentary acquaintance. His enthusiasm was
reserved for Italian scenery. She had already formed a sort of estimate of his
character, as an indifferent observer
