“DEAR Sir,—Hopping the close reached you safely i added the waterprove coat for shooting in rain supposing such happened. Miss Titch has concented to marry me some day but not now you being sir the objec of my attentions for the present hence i am happy beyond expression also she is and i hop you approve sir. Another package has come for Mister Balfour not to be oppened and marked u d t which Mr. Titch says means undertake to return but I have done nothing hopping I am right yours obediently ALFRED WINKES.”
No, Halfred, U. D. T. did not mean “Undertake to return,” but bore a much graver significance, and this news made me so thoughtful that at least one pair of bright eyes remarked it at breakfast.
“No bad news, I hope,” said Daisy, as we went together to the door to inspect the weather.
“None that you cannot make me forget,” I replied, with a more serious gallantry than I had yet shown towards her.
A little rise of color in her face did indeed make me forget all less absorbing matters.
“By the time you leave us, you perhaps won't find us still so consoling,” she replied, with a smile.
“Don't remind me of that day,” I said. “It is a long way off—a hundred years, I try to persuade myself!”
Little did I think how soon fate would laugh at my confidence.
To-day we were to shoot pheasants. The baronet had his arm out of the sling for the first time, and this so raised his spirits that I felt sure Dick's six months' probation were already divided by two, at least. Two friends were coming from a neighboring house, and the other gun was to be my second, Tonks, who was expected to stay for the night. Presently he appeared and greeted me with a friendly grin.
“You haven't got Lumme to fire at to-day,” he remarked.