"Oh, that'll be done before you know it!" I said. "What I'm thinking is that now Doctor Copin will never be allowed at Midmeadows again, if I have to keep him out by force. With him out of the way, we can manage the rest. But no more of that now. It's our wedding day! We ought to have told King to bake a cake!"
We had quieted down enough by supper-time to talk the matter over calmly and plan for to-morrow. The time had, queerly enough, more the effect of parting than the beginning of a new and happy life. Joy grew wistful and distraite as the evening wore on. I would not let her talk of "the murder," as she called it, and I tried to keep her mind from returning to the mystery of Edna's presence. Finally she said:
"Chester, I'd like to send her a message. Just think, I've never had any communication with her!"
"It will do no good," I replied.
"It will do no harm," she insisted. "I may never have another chance. I'm going to write a note for you to give her, if she comes to-morrow. Will you?"
I said that of course I would, and she sat down at her secretary and, after thinking a few minutes, biting her pen, she wrote this:
DEAR EDNA:—What has brought us together we can never know. But it is terrible to me to think that, being so closely and mysteriously related, we could not have been friends. For all you have done to me and mine, I forgive you, and somewhere and somehow I hope that you will forgive me for everything I have done to you.
JOY FIELDING.
It was the first specimen I had happened to see of Joy's handwriting, and was, as she had said, quite different from Edna's. It was bold and flowing, sharply slanted and graceful, the hand of a fast writer and a quick thinker. I put the note into my pocket to give to-morrow to Edna. I should but pass it back to the same hands that had written it, it would be read by the same eyes that saw it now—but I could guess with what scorn and anger it would be received.
Joy bade me good night with a tremor in her voice, gave me a long, clinging kiss, and looked up into my eyes.