"Any answer, Jill?"
Jill seemed to rouse herself. She had turned oddly pale.
"No, no answer, Jane."
"Thank you, miss," said Jane, and went off to tell the cook that in her opinion Jill was lacking in heart. "It might have been a bill instead of a love-letter," said Jane to the cook with indignation, "the way she read it. I like people to have a little feeling!"
Jill sat turning the letter over and over in her fingers. Her face was very white. There seemed to be a big, heavy, leaden something inside her. A cold hand clutched her throat. Uncle Chris, who at first had noticed nothing untoward, now began to find the silence sinister.
"No bad news, I hope, dear?"
Jill turned the letter between her fingers.
"Jill, is it bad news?"
"Derek has broken off the engagement," said Jill in a dull voice. She let the note fall to the floor, and sat with her chin in her hands.
"What!" Uncle Chris leaped from the hearth-rug, as though the fire had suddenly scorched him. "What did you say?"