"No, I did not see that paragraph," said John, icily.
Next morning a bundle of press-cuttings arrived.
"There is nothing here but stupid gossip," said John to his secretary, flinging the packet into the fire. "Nothing that is worth preserving in the album, I mean to say."
Miss Hamilton smiled to herself.
CHAPTER XIV
THE buzz of gossip, the sting of scandalous paragraph, even the blundering impertinence of the actor-knight were all forgotten the following afternoon when a telegram arrived from Hampshire to say that old Mrs. Touchwood was dying. John left London immediately; but when he reached Ambles he found that his mother was already dead.
"She passed away at five o'clock," Edith sobbed.
Perhaps it was to stop his wife's crying that Laurence abandoned at any rate temporarily his unbelief and proclaimed as solemnly as if he were still Vicar of Newton Candover that the old lady was waiting for them all above. Hilda seemed chiefly worried by the fact that she had never warned James of their mother's grave condition.
"I did telegraph Eleanor, who hasn't come; and how I came to overlook James and Beatrice I can't think. They'll be so hurt. But Mama didn't fret for anybody in particular. No, Hugh sat beside the bed and held her hand, which seemed to give her a little pleasure, and I was kept occupied with changing the hot-water bottles."
In the dining-room George was knitting lugubriously.