I was tossed like a tennis ball, I was one black bruise, I bounced from cushion to cushion; and then he drew up with a jerk, sprang off his horse, vanished into a house and left me, panting and dishevelled, a twist of torn ribbons and lace, alone in my carriage in the streets of Bologna." "Bologna.

Ah!" said the Countess, with a smile of significance at Wogan.
Wogan was looking at Lady Featherstone.

His curiosity, thrust into the back of his mind by the more important matter of his mission now revived.

What had been this lady's business who travelled alone to Bologna and in such desperate haste?
"Your Ladyship, I remember," he said, "gave me to understand that you were sorely put to it to reach Bologna." Her Ladyship turned her blue eyes frankly upon Wogan.

Then she lowered them.
"My brother," she explained, "lay at death's door in Venice.