The reader must submit to have himself carried back some weeks,—to those days early in January, when Mrs. Roden called upon her son to accompany her to Italy. Indeed, he must be carried back a long way beyond that; but the time during which he need be so detained shall be short. A few pages will suffice to tell so much of the early life of this lady as will be necessary to account for her residence in Paradise Row.

Mary Roden, the lady whom we have known as Mrs. Roden, was left an orphan at the age of fifteen, her mother having died when she was little more than an infant. Her father was an Irish clergyman with no means of his own but what he secured from a small living; but his wife had inherited money amounting to about eight thousand pounds, and this had descended to Mary when her father died. The girl was then taken in charge by a cousin of her own, a lady ten years her senior who had lately married, and whom we have since met as Mrs. Vincent, living at Wimbledon. Mr. Vincent had been well connected and well-to-do in the world, and till he died the household in which Mary Roden had been brought up had been luxurious as well as comfortable. Nor did Mr. Vincent die till after his wife\'s cousin had found a husband for herself. Soon afterwards he was gathered to his fathers, leaving to his widow a comfortable, but not more than a comfortable, income.

The year before his death he and his wife had gone into Italy, rather on account of his health than for pleasure, and had then settled themselves at Verona for a winter,—a winter which eventually stretched itself into nearly a year, at the close of which Mr. Vincent died. But before that event took place Mary Roden had become a wife.

At Verona, at first at the house of her own cousin,—which was of course her own home,—and afterwards in the society of the place to which the Vincents had been made welcome,—Mary met a young man who was known to all the world as the Duca di Crinola. No young man more beautiful to look at, more charming in manners, more ready in conversation, was then known in those parts of Italy than this young nobleman. In addition to these good gifts, he was supposed to have in his veins the very best blood in all Europe. It was declared on his behalf that he was related to the Bourbons and to the Hapsburgh family. Indeed there was very little of the best blood which Europe had produced in the last dozen centuries of which some small proportion was not running in his veins. He was too the eldest son of his father, who, though he possessed the most magnificent palace in Verona, had another equally magnificent in Venice, in which it suited him to live with his Duchessa. As the old nobleman did not come often to Verona, and as the young nobleman never went to Venice, the father and son did not see much of each other, an arrangement which was supposed to have its own comforts, as the young man was not disturbed in the possession of his hotel, and as the old man was reported in Verona generally to be arbitrary, hot-tempered, and tyrannical. It was therefore said of the young Duke by his friends that he was nearly as well off as though he had no father at all.

But there were other things in the history of the young Duke which, as they became known to the Vincents, did not seem to be altogether so charming. Though of all the palaces in Verona that in which he lived was by far the most beautiful to look at from the outside, it was not supposed to be furnished in a manner conformable to its external appearance. It was, indeed, declared that the rooms were for the most part bare; and the young Duke never gave the lie to these assertions by throwing them open to his friends. It was said of him also that his income was so small and so precarious that it amounted almost to nothing, that the cross old Duke at Venice never allowed him a shilling, and that he had done everything in his power to destroy the hopes of a future inheritance. Nevertheless, he was beautiful to look at in regard to his outward attire, and could hardly have been better dressed had he been able to pay his tailor and shirt-maker quarterly. And he was a man of great accomplishments, who could talk various languages, who could paint, and model, and write sonnets, and dance to perfection. And he could talk of virtue, and in some sort seem to believe in it,—though he would sometimes confess of himself that Nature had not endowed him with the strength necessary for the performance of all the good things which he so thoroughly appreciated.

Such as he was he entirely gained the affection of Mary Roden. It is unnecessary here to tell the efforts that were made by Mrs. Vincent to prevent the marriage. Had she been less austere she might, perhaps, have prevailed with the girl. But as she began by pointing out to her cousin the horror of giving herself, who had been born and bred a Protestant, to a Roman Catholic,—and also of bestowing her English money upon an Italian,—all that she said was without effect. The state of Mr. Vincent\'s health made it impossible for them to move, or Mary might perhaps have been carried back to England. When she was told that the man was poor, she declared that there was so much the more reason why her money should be given to relieve the wants of the man she loved. It ended in their being married, and all that Mr. Vincent was able to accomplish was to see that the marriage ceremony should be performed after the fashion both of the Church of England and of the Church of Rome. Mary at the time was more than twenty-one, and was thus able, with all the romance of girlhood, to pour her eight thousand pounds into the open hands of her thrice-noble and thrice-beautiful lover.

The Duchino with his young Duchessina went their way rejoicing, and left poor Mr. Vincent to die at Verona. Twelve months afterwards the widow had settled herself at the house at Wimbledon, from which she had in latter years paid her weekly visits to Paradise Row, and tidings had come from the young wife which were not altogether satisfactory. The news, indeed, which declared that a young little Duke had been born to her was accompanied by expressions of joy which the other surrounding incidents of her life were not permitted at the moment altogether to embitter. Her baby, her well-born beautiful baby, was for a few months allowed to be a joy to her, even though things were otherwise very sorrowful. But things were very sorrowful. The old Duke and the old Duchess would not acknowledge her. Then she learned that the quarrel between the father and son had been carried to such a pitch that no hope of reconciliation remained. Whatever was left of family property was gone as far as any inheritance on the part of the elder son was concerned. He had himself assisted in making over to a second brother all right that he possessed in the property belonging to the family. Then tidings of horror accumulated itself upon her and her baby. Then came tidings that her husband had been already married when he first met her,—which tidings did not reach her till he had left her alone, somewhere up among the Lakes, for an intended absence of three days. After that day she never saw him again. The next she heard of him was from Italy, from whence he wrote to her to tell her that she was an angel, and that he, devil as he was, was not fit to appear in her presence. Other things had occurred during the fifteen months in which they had lived together to make her believe at any rate the truth of this last statement. It was not that she ceased to love him, but that she knew that he was not fit to be loved. When a woman is bad a man can generally get quit of her from his heartstrings;—but a woman has no such remedy. She can continue to love the dishonoured one without dishonour to herself,—and does so.

Among other misfortunes was the loss of all her money. There she was, in the little villa on the side of the lake, with no income,—and with statements floating about her that she had not, and never had had, a husband. It might well be that after that she should caution Marion Fay as to the imprudence of an exalted marriage. But there came to her assistance, if not friendship and love, in the midst of her misfortunes. Her brother-in-law,—if she had a husband or a brother-in-law,—came to her from the old Duke with terms of surrender; and there came also a man of business, a lawyer, from Venice, to make good the terms if they should be accepted. Though money was very scarce with the family, or the power of raising money, still such was th............