"Yes, I think you can go to bed," she said. "He will not be here to-night. To-morrow night, yes."
She went up to her room, said her prayers and went to bed and was asleep immediately.
Lydia had forgotten about Jean's story until she saw her writing industriously at a small table which had been placed on the lawn. It was February, but the wind and the sun were warm and Lydia thought she had never seen a more beautiful picture than the girl presented sitting there in a garden spangled with gay flowers, heavy with the scent of February roses, a dainty figure of a girl, almost ethereal in her loveliness.
"Am I interrupting you?"
"Not a bit," said Jean, putting down her pen and rubbing her wrist. "Isn't it annoying. I've got to quite an exciting part, and my wrist is giving me hell."
She used the word so naturally that Lydia forgot to be shocked.
"Can I do anything for you?"
Jean shook her head.
"I don't exactly see what you can do," she said, "unless you could—but, no, I would not ask you to do that!"
"What is it?" asked Lydia.