Quisante by Antonio Hope

After a long sojourn in kindlier climates, Miss Quisante returned to England some eighteen months after May Gaston's marriage. From various hotels and boarding-houses she had watched with an interested eye the progress of public affairs so far as they concerned her nephew. She had seen how his name became more prominent and was more frequently mentioned, how the hopes and fears about him grew, how he had gained glory by dashing sorties in defence of the severely-pressed Government garrison; if the garrison decided (as rumour said they would) to sally out and try fortune in the open field of a General Election, and proved victorious, it could not be doubted that they would bestow a handsome reward on their gallant defender. Quisante bid fair to eclipse his rivals and to justify to the uttermost Dick Benyon's sagacity and enthusiasm. The bitterness of the foe told the same story; unless a man is feared, he is not caricatured in a comic paper in the guise of a juggler keeping three balls in the air at once, the said balls being each of them legibly inscribed with one of the three words, "Gas -- Gabble -- Grab." Such a straining of the usual amenity of controversy witnesses to grave apprehension. Miss Quisante in her _pension_ at Florence smiled contentedly.

Of his private life her information had not been very ample. She had heard several times from May, but May occupied her pen chiefly with her husband's political aims. She had heard once from Sandro himself, when he informed her that his wife had borne him a daughter and that all had gone very well indeed. Again Miss Quisante smiled approvingly. She sent her love to May and expressed to Sandro the hope that the baby would resemble its mother in appearance, constitution, and disposition; the passage was a good example of that _expressio unius_ which is a most emphatic and unmistakable _exclusio alterius_. In the letter she enclosed a cheque for three hundred pounds; the _pensions_ were cheaper than the flat, and thus this service had become possible.