In the Forest glades the night air was cool and sweet. For some distance they walked on in silence. Catherine was the first to speak. They had reached a clearing, and under the open sky the daylight still lingered.
“I daresay you’d like to read it,” said Catherine. She held out the note at arm’s length.
Helen gave a queer ejaculatory laugh.
“I’ve already done so,” she said.
“What?”
“Oh, I know it’s not quite the thing to read other people’s letters.... But I wanted to know what ... what he would say to you, and I thought perhaps you wouldn’t show me.”
Catherine crumpled up the note and put it in her pocket.
“Well, you know, anyway,” she said gloomily.
They passed again into the cool Forest glades.
“I was right,” said Helen, quietly. “I knew he’d write you something like that. He’s good at that kind of letter-writing ... sort of cheap cleverness he excels at I’d half a mind not to let you see it.”