That night, when Uncle Phil came from the post-office, he brought a letter from Aunt Jerry, enclosing one from Roy, who had written from a little inn among the Scottish hills. It was only a pleasant, friendly letter, telling of his journeyings and his mother’s health, which did not seem to improve; but it sealed Jack Heyford’s fate.
Edna had no thought of ever marrying Roy, but she could not marry Jack, and she sat down to tell him so on paper, feeling that she could do it in this way with less of pain and embarrassment to them both. And as she wrote, Roy’s letter lay open beside her, and Maude came bounding up the stairs and stood at her side, almost before she knew that she was coming. With a quick motion she put Roy’s letter away, but not until Maude’s eyes had glanced at and recognized the handwriting.
“Eureka,” she whispered softly; and then, to Edna’s utter astonishment, Maude knelt down beside her, and putting her arms around her neck, said to her: “Dotty, don’t be angry, will you? I always find out things, and you are Edna Churchill.”
Edna felt as if she was suffocating. Her throat closed spasmodically, so that she could not speak, and for an instant she sat motionless, staring at Maude, who, frightened at the expression of her face, kissed her lips, and forehead, and cheek, and said:
“Don’t take it so hard. Nobody shall know your secret from me; nobody, I assure you. I have guessed it ever so long. It was the jet which brought it to me. Roy spoke of his sister once last winter, and said he had sent her some ornaments of jet, and then it flashed over me that my little Dotty was the girl in whom I had been so interested ever since I first heard of her. Speak to me, Dot. You are not offended?”
“No,” Edna gasped at last. “Only it came so sudden. I am glad you know. I wanted you to know it, it seemed so like a miserable lie I was living all the time.”
And then the two girls talked a long, long time, of Edna’s early life, of Charlie, and of Roy, whose letter Edna showed to Maude, and of whom she never tired of hearing. Thus it came about that Edna’s note to Jack was not finished, and Edna gave him his answer verbally the next morning, when, punctual to the appointed time, he came and walked with her alone down to the clump of chestnut trees, which grew near the roadside. Something in Edna’s face, when he first saw it that morning, prepared him in part, but the blow cut deep and hurt him cruelly. Still without love, Jack did not want any woman for his wife, and when Edna said, “I respect and like you more than any man I know, but cannot find in my heart the love you ought to have in return for what you give,” he did not urge her, but took both her hands in his, and kissing them reverently, said:
“You have dealt fairly with me, Edna, and I thank you for it, and will be your friend just as I always have been. Let there be no difference between us, and in proof thereof, kiss me once. I will never ask it again.”
He stooped down to her, and she gave the boon he asked, and said to him, in a choking voice:
“God bless you, Mr. Heyford, and you may one day find a wife tenfold more worthy of you than I can ever be.” They walked slowly back to the house, and found Maude waiting for them, with her mallet in hand, and Uncle Phil in close custody, with a most lugubrious expression on his face. Maude, who was nearly croquet mad, had waylaid the old man, and captured him, and coaxed a mallet into his hand, and was leading him in triumph to the playground, when Jack and Edna came up, and she insisted upon their joining her.