"More than Mr. Bennet even?" asked her father, wickedly.
No reply of any kind was made to this sally.
But why couldn't Timothy come? Why did he want to be so horrid for? And she expressed herself with many more ejaculations of a like nature, until finally Ross suggested that it might be a wise plan to send Timothy a telegram of urgency.
Arethusa seized with pleasure on this idea.
When she learned that he would receive it this very morning, if it was started immediately, she left the breakfast-table to get her hat and coat, telling George to notify Clay that she wanted the machine right away. She insisted on personal attention to this important affair, refusing to trust the telephone, although Elinor assured her it would go just as surely. Her own handwriting, said Arethusa, would have far more effect on Timothy than the handwriting of any stranger. She knew very little about telegrams.
So Ross gave her all the details of the sending of one, and told her where it might be done, and Arethusa departed gaily with Clay, who had been called from his breakfast to serve her. She explained to him on the ride down-town how very important it all was, and just how necessary that Timothy receive this message with despatch, so that Clay, being a sensible person, could not help but feel it more vital than his breakfast.
The telegraph operator at the Patterson Hotel where Ross had told her to go, was an obliging youth at all times, and he felt still more obliging when Arethusa's vivid face appeared before him and her eager voice announced that she wanted to send a telegram; and was this the right place?
It was. He informed her further that she could send ten words for fifty cents.
Ten words was a great many; she could say almost twice as much as she wanted to in ten words.
Her first attempt went something on this order....