"I have left some things I need on the island, which I suppose I must soon go after."
"If you mention it to Guy, he will send Lem over with them," said Sibyl, with an involuntary coldness in her tone.
"Jealous still—I knew it," was his inward comment.
"I presume you do not intend visiting the lodge yourself?" he asked, after a pause.
"No; the island has few attractions for me now. I really would not care much if I never saw it again," she answered, briefly.
And there the subject dropped.
That evening when Willard returned to his hotel, he sat down and indicted the following note, without date or superscription, to Christie:
"DEAREST.—For reasons which I will explain when we meet I cannot visit you during the day. Meet me to-night, on the heath below the cottage, any time before midnight."
Lest it should by any chance fall into other hands than those for whom it was intended, he had omitted his name—knowing, besides, that it was not necessary, since the person to whom he would deliver it would tell Christie who had sent it.
Folding it up, he put it in his pocket, knowing that either Lem or Carl would in all probability visit N—— during the day, and he could seize the first opportunity of handing it to either unobserved.