"No; even you, pardon me, Miss King, don't know Amarilly as I do. She
couldn't get beyond them in her heart, although she may in other
directions. Her heart is in the right place, and it will bridge any
distance that may lie between them."
John looked up attentively and approvingly.
"Amarilly has too much aptitude for learning not to be encouraged, and I
shall do more for her before long. We have pursued a select course of
reading this winter. She has read aloud while I painted. We began
stumblingly with Alice in Wonderland and are now groping through
mythology."
After refreshments had been served, Lily Rose went to her bedroom to don
her travelling gown, and when the happy couple had driven away amid a
shower of rice and shouts from the neighbors, John's carriage drew up.
"John," asked Colette, after a happy little moment in his arms, "did you
read my note and did you see what the date was?"
"Colette, surely it was the dearest love-letter a man ever received. If
I could have had it all these dreary months!"
"Do you wonder that I feared its falling into strange hands?"
"Tell me its history, Colette. How you recovered it, and why you thought
it was in the surplice in the first place?"
"I wrote it the day after you asked me--you know--"
There was another happy disappearance and silence before she resumed: "I was sentimental enough to want to deliver it in an unusual way. I
took it to Mrs. Jenkins's house the day your surplice was to be returned
to you, and I slipped it inside the pocket. I wanted you to find it
there on Sunday morning. I didn't know what to think when you looked at
me so oddly that Sunday--yes, I know now that you were wondering at my
silence. And when we came home in the fall and I learned from Amarilly
that strangers might be reading and laughing at my ardent love-letter,
which must have passed through many and alien hands, I was so horrified
I couldn't act rational or natural. I was--yes, I will 'fess up, John,--
I was unreasonable, as you said and--No, John! wait until I finish
before you--"
"You want to know how and where it was found? It seems at the same time
your surplice was laundered, a lace waist of mine was at their house. I
didn't care for a 'fumigated waist' so, like you, I made Amarilly a
present perforce. She laid it away in its wrappings to keep until her
wedding day. Out of the goodness of her generous little heart she loaned
it to Lily Rose and yesterday, when they were trying it on, Amarilly
found my note in the sleeve. Mrs. Jenkins was appealed to and remembered
that when the things were ready to be sent home, she found the note on
the floor, and supposing it had fallen from the waist slipped it inside
and forgot all about it. I decided that it should be delivered in the
manner originally planned."