Winifred caught a glimpse of Frank’s handwriting. Her face grew scarlet. For one delightful instant she forgot the harsh thoughts she had harbored against him. Then the scourge of memory tortured her. Fulton’s kindly assumption that Malcolm was her fiancé must be dispelled and she bit her lower lip in vexation at the tell-tale rush of color that had mantled her cheeks when Ungud discharged his trust and gave her the letter.
“It is from Captain Malcolm,” she said coldly. “I suppose he wishes his personal belongings to be safeguarded. I am surprised he did not write to my uncle rather than to me.”
Fulton was surprised, but he laughed lightly.
“Every one to his taste,” he said; “but from what little I have seen of Malcolm I should wager that nine out of ten letters addressed to the Mayne family would be intended for you, Miss Winifred. By the way, a word in your ear. General Inglis hopes to persuade our friend here to try his luck on a return journey to-night. Perhaps you may have a note to send on your own account. No one else must know. This is a special favor, conferred because Malcolm himself procured Ungud’s services, but we cannot ask the man to act as general postman. Good-by.”
He hurried away. Winifred, after the manner of woman, fingered the unopened letter.
“Kuch joab hai, miss-sahib?” asked Ungud.
“There is no answer—yet. I will give you one later.”
The girl’s Hindustani went far enough to enable her to frame the reply intelligibly. Ungud salaamed and left her, probably contrasting in his own mind the lady’s frigidity with the fervid instructions given him by the officer-sahib.
Then Winifred went to her own room and opened her letter, and her woman’s heart gleaned the truth from its candor. Of course she cried. What girl wouldn’t? But she smiled through her tears and read the nice bits over and over again. Not for twenty necklaces and a whole file of hieroglyphic passes would she doubt Frank any more.