“Have you written to her?” she demanded.
“Er, no. Not yet. I mean, it’s a delicate matter.”
“Virgil,” said Miss Vulliamy. “Unless you write to her to-day, I won’t
marry you.”
“But——”
“That’s flat,” said Sarah. “I mean what I say. After all this time, to
let that poor girl see our engagement in the paper and nurse her sorrow
without one word of explanation or regret. . . . I confess I’m
disgusted. No honourable man——”
“I’m not an honourable man,” said Pardoner. “I’m a loathsome and
venomous worm. Ask Mrs. Closeley Dore.”
“You will write to her now,” said Sarah. “You will send for a sheet of
notepaper and write to her now—in the lounge. I’ll help you.”
By the time the document was settled, it was a quarter to four.
_My Dear June_,
_Possibly by now you will have seen the announcement of my
engagement in the papers. Had I been able, I should have wished
to tell you of it myself, but a recent bereavement has not only
kept me in London, but has affected my brain. The marriage I am
contracting is one which you would have been the first to wish
me to make. Indeed, I have often fancied that I could hear your
soft voice urging me to go forward. My poor uncle is dead, dear,
and I have reason to believe that it was his earnest desire that
I should wed his ward. I feel, therefore, that the least I can
do is to respect his wishes. Nothing, however, can take away the
memory of the many happy, happy hours we have spent together,
and I look forward confidently to bringing my wife to see you,
as soon as we are settled. I am sure that you and she will get
on together, and perhaps one day you will come and stay with us
at Palfrey, which we shall make our home._
_Your affectionate friend,_
_Virgil Pardoner._
“Now address it,” said Sarah, “and send for a stamp.”
Pardoner hesitated.
“I’ld, er, I’ld like to sleep on it,” he said. “I mean, it’s—it’s a
ticklish business.”
Miss Vulliamy indicated an envelope with a firm pointed finger.
“Pretty hands you’ve got,” said Virgil musingly. “Pretty nails, too.”
“What are June’s like?”
“Oh, very good,” said Virgil. “Full of character, you know. But yours
are bewitching. That left one——”
“Apostate,” said Sarah. “And now address this envelope.”
Virgil did so laboriously.
_Miss June Townshend,_
_The Rectory,_
_Roughbridge,_
_Lincolnshire._
They posted the letter together, before they parted.
* * * * *
It was two days later that Mrs. Purdoe Blewitt was seriously annoyed.
“Such impudence,” she said, bristling. “As if she were the daughter of
the house. . . .”
The Reverend Purdoe Blewitt, Rector of Loughbridge, laid down his pen.
“What is the matter, my dear?”
His wife stabbed at the bell and flounced into a chair before replying.
“Jane, of course,” she snorted. “Fortunately, I met the postman, or I
should never have known.” She tapped a letter with meaning. “She’s still
doing it.”
The Rector knew better than to inquire the nature of the iniquity. Mrs.
Blewitt believed in remembering her servants’ offences and expected this
belief to be shared. He assumed an aggravated look.
“How very trying,” he said, playing for safety. “I should say to her
that the next time she does it——”
“Does what?” said his wife.
The Rector started guiltily.
“I understood you to say, my dear,” he faltered, “that she was still
doing it.”
“So she is,” said his wife.
The Reverend Purdoe Blewitt put a hand to his head.
“It’s not nice of her,” he said, blindly endeavouring to avoid
collision. “Not at all nice. I mean——”
Here he observed that his wife was surveying him with a profound
contempt, and quailed accordingly.
The appearance of a pert parlourmaid postponed his chastisement.
“Jane,” said Mrs. Blewitt, at once averting her face and stretching
forth the letter as though it were some contagious body, “I suppose it
is not the slightest good desiring you to remember that your address is
not _The Rectory, Loughbridge_, but _c/o The Rev. Purdoe Blewitt, The
Rectory, Loughbridge_. However, for what it is worth, I will again point
out that, even if you were here as a guest—which you are not—it would
be the essence of bad taste to omit the Rector’s name from the head of
your notepaper.”
“An’ if,” sweetly rejoined Miss Townshend, taking the letter, “if your
gues’s frien’s—not knowin’ you—didn’t take no notice of what was wrote
at the ’ead of the notepaper, I s’pose your gues’s ’ld still get it in
the neck.” Mrs. Purdoe Blewitt recoiled, and the Rector emitted a
protesting noise. “You know, you’re too particular to live, you are; and
p’raps you’ll take this as notice. Servants aren’t no good to you. What
you want is ’alf a dozen Archangels—and then you’ld show ’em ’ow to
wear their wings.”
Apparently unable to speak, Mrs. Blewitt, crimson with fury, clawed at
the air, while the Rector, feeling that something must be done, rose to
his feet and cleared his throat.
Ere words came, however, Miss Townshend was out of the room.
The look of her letter was promising.
This had been addressed to ‘Roughbridge,’ but, there being no such
place, the Post Office had risen to the occasion and above the mistake.
* * * * *
Five days had gone by since Mrs. Purdoe Blewitt had been so annoyed, and
Pardoner and Miss Vulliamy were dining together, ostensibly to discuss
arrangements for their alliance, actually because they enjoyed each
other’s company.
“I wonder she hasn’t replied,” said Sarah, obediently sipping her
champagne.
Virgil shrugged his shoulders.
“I daresay she won’t,” he said. “She’s very considerate. I mean, it’s
delicate ground, and it’ld be just like June if she sank her own
feelings and, er, let bygones be bygones.”
His fiancée shook her head.
“If she doesn’t answer,” she said, “I shall be really worried. Silence
can only mean one of two things: either that she doesn’t know how to
behave——”
“Oh, she knows how to behave all right.”
“—or that she’s almost beside herself.”
“No, no,” said Virgil. “June’s not that kind of girl. I shan’t be at all
surprised, if she doesn’t reply. In fact, I should be rather surprised,
if she did. You know, I had a feeling, when I wrote that letter, that it
would never be answered. You see, June——”
“But you used to kiss her, you know.”
Pardoner pulled his moustache.
“Once in a while,” he said. “But I never made a meal of it. It was more
of a salute.”
Miss Vulliamy stared across the room.
“I think,” she said softly, “your love for her is very beautiful.”
“Was,” said Virgil uneasily. “I’ve—I’ve trodden it under.”
Sarah shuddered.
“Hush,” she said. “Hush. Don’t talk like that, Virgil. It’s—it’s
blasphemy.”
As she spoke, a page came to the table.
“Mr. Pardoner, sir?”
“Yes,” said Virgil.
“Miss Townshend would like to speak to you, sir, on the telephone.”
Pardoner started. Then he turned to Sarah with a sheepish smile.
“Who’s come in on this little deal?” he demanded.
“Whatever d’you mean?” said Miss Vulliamy, striving to keep her voice
steady.
“Nothing doing,” said Virgil, continuing to smile. “Admit it’s a plant.”
“By all that’s solemn,” said Sarah. “I swear I’ve nothing to do with
it.”
“But you’ve——”
“I haven’t, Virgil. I swear I haven’t, I’ld—I’ld be ashamed,” she added
tearfully.
Three times did her betrothed endeavour to speak.