But it failed to propitiate Magda in the slightest degree. She felt intensely annoyed that anyone from the outside world—from her world of London—should have intruded upon her seclusion at Ashencombe, nor could she imagine how Davilof had discovered her retreat.
“How did you learn I was here?” she asked.
“From Melrose.”
Magda’s eyes darkened sombrely.
“Do you mean you bribed him?” she asked quickly. “Oh, but surely not!”—in dismayed tones. “Melrose would go to the stake sooner than accept a bribe!”
Davilof’s mouth twisted in a rueful smile.
“I’m sure he would! I tried him, but he wouldn’t look at a bribe of any sort. So I had to resort to strategy. It was one evening, when he was taking your letters to post, and I waited for him at the pillar-box. I came up very quietly behind him and just nipped one of the letters, readdressed to you, out of his hand. I read the address and then posted the letter for him. It was very simple.”
He recounted the incident with a little swaggering air of bravado, boyishly delighted at the success of his small ruse. Vexed as she was Magda could hardly refrain from smiling; the whole thing was so eminently un-English—so exactly like Davilof!
“Well, now that you have seen me, will you please go away again?” she said coolly, reopening her book as though to end the conversation.
He regarded her with unqualified reproach.