"How goes Geier-Wally?"
Mona had a decided gift for teaching, and the next half-hour passed pleasantly for both of them. Then, in a very shamefaced way, Matilda drew a letter from her pocket. "I wanted to tell you," she said, "I have been writing to—to—my friend."
Her face turned crimson as she spoke. She had met Mona several times, but this was the first reference either of them had made to the original subject of debate.
"Have you?" said Mona quietly.
"Yes. Would you mind reading the letter? I should like to know if there is anything I ought to alter."
Mona read the letter. It was headed by a showy crest and address-stamp, and it was without exception the most pathetic and the most ridiculous production she had ever seen. It was very long, and very sentimental: it made repeated reference to "your passionate love"; and, to Mona's horror, it wound up with the line about the martyrs.
However, it had one saving feature. Between the beginning and the end, Matilda did contrive to give expression to the conviction that she had done wrong in meeting her correspondent, and to the determination that she never would do it again. Compared with this everything else mattered little.
"Is that what you would have said?" she asked eagerly, as Mona finished reading it.
"It would be valueless if it were," said Mona, smiling. "He wants your views, not mine. But in quoting that line you are creating for yourself a lofty tradition that will not always be easy to live up to. I speak to myself as much as to you, for it was I who set you the example—for evil or good. You and I burn our boats when we allow ourselves to repeat a line like that."
"I want to burn them," said Matilda eagerly, only half understanding what was in Mona's mind. "I am quite sure you have burned yours. Then you don't want me to write it over again?"