Wyllard excused himself, but when Mr. Radcliffe urged him to dine with them on the following evening he hesitated.
“The one difficulty is that I don’t know yet whether I shall be engaged then,” he said. “As it happens, I’ve a message for Miss Ismay, and I wrote offering to call upon her at any convenient hour. So far, I have heard nothing from her.”
“She’s away,” Mrs. Radcliffe informed him. “They have probably sent your letter on to her. I had a note from her yesterday, however, and expect her here to-morrow. You have met some friends of hers in Canada?”
“Gregory Hawtrey,” said Wyllard. “I have promised to call upon his people, too.”
He saw Major Radcliffe glance at his wife, and he noticed a faint gleam in Mrs. Radcliffe’s eyes.
“Well,” she observed, “if you promise to come I will send word over to Agatha.”
Wyllard agreed to this, and went away a few minutes later. He noticed the tact and consideration with which his new friends had refrained from indicating any sign of the curiosity they naturally felt, for Mrs. Radcliffe’s face had suggested that she understood the situation, which was beginning to appear a little more difficult to him. It was, it seemed, his task to explain delicately to a girl brought up among such people what she must be prepared to face as a farmer’s wife in Western Canada. He was not sure that this task would be easy in itself, but it was rendered much more difficult by the fact that Hawtrey would expect him to accomplish it without unduly daunting her. Her letter certainly had suggested courage, but, after all, it was the courage of ignorance, and he had now some notion of the life of ease and refinement her English friends enjoyed. He was beginning to feel sorry for Agatha Ismay.