Page:C N and A M Williamson - The Lightning Conductor.djvu/356

 but Aunt Mary didn't seem to mind. She just bowed to everybody and trotted away, as meek as a fat white lamb, and Mr. Payne engaged another cab for Miss Randolph and himself, and we drove down the hill. Those two were in front of us, and I could see him talking to her all the way like a father-confessor, his face close to her ear; but she never looked round at him once.

I was almost as much excited as Lady B. by the time we stopped at the gate of Sir Evelyn Haines' house, which used to be a monastery. Most things in Sicily seem to have been monasteries or palaces. Our luggage had been sent straight up there from the railway station in another cab, for owing to Lady B.'s state of mind at Syracuse, no word had been sent as to what train we would arrive by. You don't drive in, for it isn't a modern gentleman's place at all, but has been left as much as possible as it was in old, old days. We walked, Lady B. leaning on Pa's arm, I by her other side, and Mr. Payne behind us with Miss Randolph, because she wouldn't go ahead, though I know he wanted to.

It's really a beautiful place, for people who like that old-fashioned, queer kind of thing, with a lovely garden, full of all kinds of flowers such as you see at home, and quite tropical ones, too. There were a great many well-dressed people walking about, for the charity bazaar was on, and no doubt everybody was glad of a chance to get into the house and talk about it afterwards as if they knew Sir Evelyn and had been his guests. There were tables set out under the trees, and tea was being carried round.