“I think that I shall tell him straight out that I have valuable property belonging to him, and that the sooner he fetches it away the better I shall like it,” Bertha answered shortly, for the whole thing got upon her nerves.
“Oh, don’t do that!” cried Grace distressfully. “If you put a thing like that in black and white, I shall never dare to be left alone again, for I shall always be afraid that someone will come along to try and rob the house. As it is, there is no danger at all; for the most optimistic of thieves would hardly expect to find anything worth carrying away in the house of a hailed-out farmer.”
“What can I say, then?” asked Bertha. “You see I must ask him to come and fetch his property away, as I could not possibly send valuables like that through the post.”
“Could you not write to him and ask him if he would kindly come over to see you as soon as he is able to leave the police barracks? You might say that you had news of importance for him which you could not very well put in a letter. That would commit you to nothing, and if anyone else read it they would not be unduly enlightened,” said Grace.
“I might do that, certainly, although I should think that he will be mightily amazed, and perhaps a little disgusted, at receiving a letter of that description from a girl he knows nothing about,” said Bertha, shrugging her shoulders; for the letter written by Mrs. Fricker to her son had somehow left the impression that Mr. Bradgate was the sort of individual to be approached with respect.
“He will be surprised, probably; but as Mrs. Fricker speaks of him so highly, he is probably a gentleman, so he will do as you ask him, without unpleasant comment, and really I do not see how else you can hope to see him, unless you ask him to come here. Would you like to get Eunice to come and stay with me while someone drives you to Rownton?” asked Grace.
“That would certainly be simpler than dragging a man who is an invalid so many miles across the snow,” said Bertha.
“Write your letter to Eunice instead, then.” Grace had quite an eager note in her tone now, for in her way she was quite as eager as Bertha to get rid of that little case of dull-looking stones which had been in the house so long.
Bertha wrote the letter, but it was Wednesday before there was any chance of getting it sent to Pentland Broads, and it was the following Sunday before she received a reply, and then Eunice wrote that it would be a week before she could get away, as Mrs. Humphries was in bed with bronchitis, and there was no one else to take the post office from her shoulders.
“It seems as if I were fated to keep those wretched stones,” said Bertha, when she had read the letter from Eunice.