"A Miss Feverel—she lives with her mother at Sea view Terrace—there is no father."
"Miss Feverel? What! That girl! You wrote to her! You——"
At last his aunt had spoken. He had never heard her speak like that before—the "You!" was a cry of horror. She suddenly got up and went over to him. She bent over him where he sat, with head lowered, and shook him by the shoulder.
"Robin! It can't be true—you haven't written to that girl! Not love-letters! It is incredible!"
"It is true—" he said, looking up. "Don't look at me like that, Aunt Clare. It isn't so bad—other fellows——" but then he was ashamed and stopped. He would leave his defence alone.
"Is that all?" said Garrett. "All you have done, I mean? You haven't injured the girl?"
"I swear that's all," Robin said eagerly. "I meant no harm by it. I wrote the letters without thinking I——"
Clare stood leaning on the mantelpiece, her head between her hands.
"I can't understand it. I can't understand it," she said. "It isn't like you—not a bit. That girl and you—why, it's incredible!"
"That's only because you had your fancy idea of him, Clare," said Garrett. "We'd better pass the lamentation stage and decide what's to be done."