‘I promised for myself. I couldn’t promise for what was put into a newspaper and trumpeted all over the place,’ said Gillian, really angry now.
Dolores could not deny this, but she was hurt by the word trumpeted; and besides, her own slippery behaviour was weakening her trust in other people’s sincerity, and she only gave a kind of grunt; but Gillian, recovering herself a little, and remembering her mother’s words, proceeded to argue. ‘Besides, it was me whom Jasper meant to tease, not you.’
‘I don’t care which it was. He is as bad as the rest of them!’
Gillian attempted no more conciliation, and they arrived in silence at the Casement Cottages, where Constance was awaiting her friend in the greatest excitement; for she had despatched ‘The Waif of the Moorland’ to Mr. Flinders in the course of the week, and had received a letter from him in return, saying that a personal interview with the gifted authoress would be desirable.
‘And I do long to see him; don’t you, darling?
‘It is very hard that he should be kept away from me,’ said Dolores, trying to stir up some tender feelings.
‘That it is, my poor sweet! I thought whether he could come to me for a merely literary consultation without Mary’s knowing anything further about it, and then we could contrive for you to come down and meet him; but there are so many horrid prejudices that I suppose it would not be safe.’
‘I don’t see how I could come down here without the others. Aunt Lily won’t let me come alone, and though it is holiday time, that is no good, for those horrid boys are always about, and I see that Jasper is going to be worse even than Wilfred.
Various ways and means were discussed, but no excuse seemed available for either Constance’s going to Darminster, or for Mr. Flinders coming to Silverton, without exciting suspicion.