He did not enjoy himself very much at Antibes. La Dolciquita
could talk of nothing with any enthusiasm except money, and she
tired him unceasingly, during every waking hour, for presents of
the most expensive description. And, at the end of a week, she just
quietly kicked him out. He hung about in Antibes for three days.
He was cured of the idea that he had any duties towards La
Dolciquita--feudal or otherwise. But his sentimentalism required
of him an attitude of Byronic gloom--as if his court had gone into
half-mourning. Then his appetite suddenly returned, and he
remembered Leonora. He found at his hotel at Monte Carlo a
telegram from Leonora, dispatched from London, saying; "Please
return as soon as convenient." He could not understand why
Leonora should have abandoned him so precipitately when she
only thought that he had gone yachting with the Clinton Morleys.
Then he discovered that she had left the hotel before he had
written the note. He had a pretty rocky journey back to town; he
was frightened out of his life--and Leonora had never seemed so
desirable to him.
V I CALL this the Saddest Story, rather than "The Ashburnham
Tragedy", just because it is so sad, just because there was no
current to draw things along to a swift and inevitable end.
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