"I shall put this money aside," Miss Verney announced, "because I am most anxious to prove that £100 a year is ample for me. Extravagance has always been my temptation!"
Later in the afternoon Pauline left her friend and went down Wychford High Street toward home. There were great wine-dark dahlias in the gardens, and the bell was sounding for Evensong. She knelt behind a pillar, all of the congregation. How through this winter that was coming she would love her father and mother. And if Guy ever came back ... if Guy ever came back....
She heard her father's voice dying away with the close of the Office; and presently they walked about the golden churchyard, arm-in-arm.
"I shouldn't be surprized to see Sternbergia Lutea this year," he observed. "We have had a lot of sun."
"Have we?" Pauline sighed.
"Oh, yes, a great deal of sun."
Her father of course would never speak of that broken engagement, and already she had made her mother promise never to speak of it again. Deep to her inmost heart only these familiar vales and streams and green meadows would speak of it for the rest of her life.
THE END
Capri
December, 1914—April, 1915
PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY
WM. BRENDON AND SON, LTD.
PLYMOUTH