"Read it to me," Hilda said, "I'm tired."
"Oh, do you very much mind? I would rather——"
She took the missive; it was dated the day before, Colombo, and read:
"Do not expect me. Was married this morning to Colonel Markin. S. A. We may not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. Glory be to God.
"Laura Markin."
She raised her eyes to his with the gravest, saddest irony.
"Then you—you also are delivered," she said. But he said, "What?" without special heed; and I doubt whether he ever took the trouble to understand.
"One hopes he isn't a brute," Lindsay went on with most impersonal solicitude, "and can support her. I suppose there isn't any way one could do anything for her. I heard a story only yesterday about a girl changing her mind on the way out. By Jove, I didn't suppose it would happen to me!"
"If you are hurt anywhere," Hilda said, absently, "it is only your vanity, I fancy."
"Ah, my vanity is very sore." He paused for an instant, wondering to find so little expansion in her. "I came to ask after Arnold," he said. "How is he?"