‘And surely wouldn’t wish to?’
‘I don’t know. Girls often can’t see what’s best for them. I say, you understand that all this is in confidence?’
‘Of course I do. But it’s a confidence I had rather not have received. I shall be miserable, I know that.’
‘Then you’re a little—goose.’
‘You were going to call me something far worse.’
‘Give me credit, then, for correcting myself. You’ll have to help us, Lettycoco.’
The girl kept silence. Then for a time the conversation became graver. It was interrupted precisely at the end of the granted hour.
Letty went to see her friend on Sunday afternoon, and the two shut themselves up in the dainty little chamber. Adela was in low spirits; with her a most unusual state. She sat with her hands crossed on her lap, and the sunny light of her eyes was dimmed. When she had tried for a while to talk of ordinary things, Letty saw a tear glisten upon her cheek.
‘What is the matter, love?’
Adela was in sore need of telling her troubles, and Letty was the only one to whom she could do so. In such spirit-gentle words as could express the perplexities of her mind she told what a source of pain her mother’s conversation had been to her of late, and how she dreaded what might still be to come.