“I will come with you,” said John Steadman. “I fancy an interview with the Yellow Dog may be extraordinarily interesting.”
Chapter XVIII
“I cannot live without you, Cecily. This bogy of yours shall not separate us. Surely my love is strong enough to help you to bear whatever the future can hold. Till the last hour of my life I shall be your devoted lover, Tony.”
A momentary sensation of warmth and light ran through Cecily's cold frame as she read the impassioned sentences. Very resolutely she had put Anthony Collyer's love from her. She had told herself that she was a moral leper set far apart from all thoughts of love or marriage. It was not in the nature of a mortal girl to read such words and remain unmoved.
She was sitting at her table in Madeline Bechcombe's private sitting-room. As she finished reading her letter she made a movement as though to tuck it in the breast of her gown, then, changing her mind, she tossed it into the very centre of the bright fire on the hearth.
At this same moment Mrs. Bechcombe came into the room. She glanced curiously at the paper just bursting into momentary flame.
“I wish you would not burn papers here, Miss Hoyle,” she said fretfully. “It does litter up the hearth so and there is a waste-paper-basket over there.”
“I am very sorry, I quite forgot,” Cecily said penitently. “Mrs. Bechcombe, this is a letter from Lady Chard-Green. She wants you to go to them for a week-end, the 3rd or the 10th if that would suit you better.”
“They will neither of them suit me at all,” Mrs. Bechcombe said decisively. “You can tell her so. I wonder whether she would feel inclined to go about week-ending if her husband had been cruelly murdered?”
Cecily shivered as she took up the next letter.