"Have you any letters to write, dear child?" Mrs. Vandeleur's silvery tones broke in. "I shall be sending Susan to the post with mine within the next half-hour."
"There is just one I want to write, if you please," the secretary answered.
And Mrs. Vandeleur obligingly made room for her at the other end of her writing-table.
Laline took a pen between her fingers; but the letter was not so easily written. There was very much she wished to tell Wallace Armstrong, and very much again that she did not want him to know. She wanted to tell him that she would willingly come to see his uncle, since he so much desired it, but that, having once refused, she did not see her way to changing her mind without exciting comment. She would also have liked him to know that she by no means hated him, that she might even in time be induced to like him very much, but that if he wished to please her he must refrain from talking about her to Mrs. Vandeleur.
But she had no idea how to word her letter, and, even before writing it, she began to rack her brains in the vain endeavour to remember whether her husband possessed or had ever seen any of her handwriting.
Finally, having wasted more than ten minutes, she seized her pen and began the heading, "Dear Mr. Armstrong," hoping that other words would come.
A little laugh, like that of a mischievous fairy, made her start and drop the pen.
"'Dear Mr. Armstrong,' and nothing more?" Mrs. Vandeleur asked, mockingly. "That is not a very fluent love-letter for the poor young gentleman, is it?"
Laline looked at once astonished and confused. But Mrs. Vandeleur's prescience in this case was easily explained. She had recognised the writing on the envelope of Wallace's letter, and had watched Laline's fingers tracing three words, which she guessed to be those she quoted.