"Hilda, see here a minute," said Mrs. Needham; and she beckoned discreetly. Hilda followed her mother into the cottage.
This left the Rev. Needham on one side of the screening and Miss Whitcom on the other. Miss Whitcom still sat on the second step with the pen in her hand. She had dipped the pen a good many times, but the letter was no further advanced. She turned to watch Leslie get in the last full strokes and crawl out. He lay in the hot sand a moment or so before racing indoors.
The Rev. Needham had sunk into the nearest chair, and sat there rocking, with just perceptible nervousness, clearing his throat from time to time in a manner which appeared to afford that portion of his anatomy no appreciable relief. It seemed a kind of moral clearing. It was the vague articulation of incertitude.
As a matter of fact, Marjory had forgotten all about her brother-in-law. She was musing. At length a more desperate laryngeal disturbance than any that had preceded brought her back to contemporary consciousness.
"Ho!" she cried. "I didn't know you were there, Alfred!" There were times when he thought her almost coarse.
"I thought I'd just come out here a few minutes," he said. "It's quite cool on this side, till the sun gets round." The minister sighed. He had an uncomfortable inner feeling that he hadn't quite justified his presence. It was, to be sure, his own porch; but that did not make any difference. Dimly he hoped his relation would not relinquish her position on the second step.
Marjory dipped her pen again, but the letter was doomed. With a gesture of languid, smiling despair the task was conclusively abandoned.
"No, it's no use," she muttered, rather unintelligibly. "I never can concentrate at a resort."
"Beg pardon, Marjory?"