“To-morrow, or next day. They sailed on the tenth; to-morrow is the seventeenth, but they may rest for a day in Liverpool—”
“Or stay a day or two in London,” suggested Sir Stuart.
“I hope not, for my guests will be impatient to see a real live American ex-governor. Quincy's political advancement has been very rapid.”
“America is a rapid country, my dear,” was Sir Stuart's comment.
When Lady Fernborough reached her boudoir, she seated herself at her writing desk and wrote rapidly for nearly an hour.
“I don't wish too many guests,” she soliloquized as she sealed the last invitation. “Now, I must write to Linda.”
“My dear Linda,
“I have a great surprise for you. You must forgive me for keeping a secret. I do it so seldom, I wished the experience. I am like the penniless suitor who proposed to an heiress, who, he knew, would reject him, just to see how it would make him feel to lose a fortune. I think I saw that in Punch, but it fits my case exactly. They will be here, sure, day after to-morrow. I mean Quincy and Alice, and, I hope, Maude. Come and bring all the children. I suppose Algernon is in London helping to make laws for unruly Britishers, but we will make merry and defy the constables. Despite my marital patronymic, and my armorial bearings, I am still, your loving aunt Ella.”
Alice was not to tell the sad news to Lady Fernborough. The telegraph outstrips the ocean liner, and a newspaper, with tidings of the great calamity, was in Aunt Ella's hands long before the arrival of the broken-hearted wife and disconsolate sister. The invitations were countermanded, and days of sorrow followed instead of the anticipated time of joyfulness.
Alice and Florence told the story of the tragedy over and over again to sympathizing listeners.