It was close on midnight when Letty at last raised her little chin from the hands that held it and rang the bell that communicated with her maid's room, but cautiously, so as not to disturb the rest of the sleeping house.
"If Grier is asleep, she must wake up, that's all!"
Two or three minutes afterwards a dishevelled maid startled out of her first slumber appeared, to ask whether her mistress was ill.
"No, Grier, but I wanted to tell you that I have changed my mind about staying here till Saturday. I am going to-morrow morning by the 9.30 train. You can order a fly first thing, and bring me my breakfast early."
The maid, groaning at the thought of the boxes that would have to be packed in this inconceivable hurry, ventured to protest.
"Never mind, you can get the housemaid to help you," said Miss Sewell, decidedly. "I don't mind what you give her. Now go to bed, Grier. I'm sorry I woke you up; you look as tired as an owl."
Then she stood still, looking at herself—hands clasped lightly before her—in the long glass.
"'Letty went by the nine o'clock train,'" she said aloud, smiling, and mocking her own white reflection. "'Dear me! How sudden! how extraordinary! Yes, but that's like her. H'm—' Then he must write to me, for I shall write him a civil little note asking for that book I lent him. Oh! I hope Aunt Watton and his mother will bore him to death!"
She broke out into a merry laugh; then, sweeping her mass of pretty hair to one side, she began rapidly to coil it up for the night, her fingers working as fast as her thoughts, which were busy with one ingenious plan after another for her next meeting with George Tressady.