"Why on earth should you fail; you're very clever, aren't you?"
She began to laugh. "I don't know if I'm what you would call clever; you see you think yourself clever, and I'm not a bit like you. I like working, though, so perhaps I'd get through."
Elizabeth, coming towards them across the lawn, heard the laugh and blessed Richard.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
1
IT is strange in this world, how events of momentous importance happen without any warning, and do not, as is commonly stated, "Cast their shadows before." Moreover, they reach us from the most unexpected quarters and at a time when we are least prepared, and such an event dropped out of space upon the Ogden household a few days later.
The concrete form which it took was simple enough—a small business envelope on Colonel Ogden's breakfast tray; he opened it, and as he read his face became suffused with excitement. He tried to get up, but the tea spilt in his efforts to remove the heavy tray from his lap.
"Mary!" he shouted, "Mary!"
Mrs. Ogden, who was presiding at the breakfast table, heard him call, and also the loud thumping of the stick which he now kept beside the bed. He used it freely to attract his family's attention to his innumerable needs. She rose hastily.
Joan and Milly heard the quick patter of her steps as she hurried upstairs, followed, in what seemed an incredibly short time, by her tread on the bedroom floor, and then the murmur of excited conversation. Joan sighed.