“Oh, my dear, you are half-killed,” she said. “Wait one moment.”
She went away again, and came back with a glass of wine in her hand.
“You must drink this. It’s my turn to be nurse now.”
“I’m not ill,” said Amethyst, taking the wine; but she laid her head on Una’s shoulder, and submitted passively to her caresses.
“Now,” she said, after a few minutes, “tell me all you know about things.”
“I know it all,” said Una. “We heard a great deal, and then mother came and told us. She was crying, and she said that she had been so much upset, that she’d actually made a scene, which was quite against her principles, and frightened you. But she says she hasn’t ‘said die’ yet, so she is going to take Kat and Tory to the duchess’s garden-party, and ‘see how she can represent things.’ They had better see a great party once, she said, if they never could again. And Sir Richard is to come again, then she thinks you won’t refuse him.”
“Oh yes, I shall, Una—I have,” said Amethyst, with a fresh ring in her voice for a moment.
“Then it seems that now,” continued Una, “it is quite impossible for Charles to marry, and Aunt Anna does nothing but cry, and repent bitterly of having thrown Carrie in his way. But Carrie turned round like a little fury, and said that she had told Charles that she liked him, and so she did, and that she meant to keep her word, and she has appealed to her uncle. He must have known all along how wrong it was. Isn’t it hard upon her?”
“Yes,” said Amethyst, “but I must get through my own business first. I am going to write Sir Richard a note which will stop him from coming, and you must take care that he gets it in time.” There was a vigour in her manner which astonished Una, as she rose and bathed her face, and wrote a few lines in a fairly steady hand.
“Dear Sir Richard,—
“I will not let you deceive yourself nor be deceived by others about me. I did intend to accept your offer, for I wished to be content with all the good things you would give me. But I cannot, and I shall never change my mind again. I cannot ask you to forgive me, but I acknowledge that I have behaved very ill to you. You have been most generous. All I can do now, is to spare you doubt and delay. I beg you to take this as a final refusal from—
“Amethyst Haredale.”