"Certainly. Write it and I'll give it to a messenger."
"A messenger!" said Cynthia doubtfully. "Will it be sure to reach him? It's rather important."
Brook smiled.
"Very well. I'll take it in myself, Mrs. Rames."
Cynthia took a little diary from the bag she carried, tore out a leaf, scribbled hastily:
"You did splendidly. Everybody thinks so. Cynthia;" and having calmly perpetrated that obvious untruth, she twisted up her message and handed it to Brook. The sandy-haired man from the Shires was drifting about the lobby. Brook called to him. "Look after Mrs. Rames for a moment, will you?" he said, and hurried off through the swing-doors.
It seemed a very short time to Cynthia before he came back, though in that short time she had not so much as addressed a word to her companion. She looked at Robert Brook's hands. They were empty and a shadow passed over her face.
"Did you give it him?" she asked.
"I passed it along the bench and saw that it reached him. I didn't wait for him to open it."
The shadow passed from Cynthia. She was disappointed now, but not hurt; and in a second the disappointment passed too. This was not the day on which small things should be allowed to sting.