At once I got up, with some blind, blundering idea, I believe, of stopping him, of frustrating them, but Anita was nearer to him than I.
“Is she asleep? Very good of you, Kent. Sit here, Kent. Jenny, is the window open in the passage? Very cold. I never knew such a draught.”
I went out to see. I had to do as I was told. Besides, how could I have stopped them or him? Yet I was shaking with anger and disgust at them, and at myself for my hateful tongue-tied youth and insignificance. An older woman would have known what to do. Shaking with cold too—Anita was right—it was bitter cold in the passage. I could hardly see my way to the window for the fog. It was open an inch at the bottom, and at my touch it rattled down with a bang that echoed oddly. For an instant I thought it was a knock at the hall door. I stood a minute, quite startled, peering down into the black well of the hall. But there was no second knock, only the fog-laden draught of the passage came rushing up at me again, and again Anita called to me to come in and shut the door. I did so: and because it rattled, wedged it with the screw of paper that lay near it on the floor, the crumpled telegram that Kent Rehan had dropped when he first came in. Then, still shivering a little, I sat down where I was. I didn’t want to go nearer. I knew my face was tell-tale. I didn’t want to have the Baxter girl looking at me, and maybe saying something. I could hear them in the other room well enough. Anita’s voice seemed to cut through the thick air. There was a letter in her hand. She was twisting it about as if she couldn’t find the first page.
“—obviously a draft.” She held it away from her. Anita was long-sighted.
Then it breaks off and begins again. You see?” She displayed it to them.
“Why, how clearly it’s written!” The Baxter girl peered at it. “That’s quite a beautiful hand. That’s not Madala’s scrawl.”
The blonde lady looked at them through half-shut lids.
“As if she loved writing it!” The Baxter girl flushed. “Did _she_ know about that sort of thing—that sentimental sort of thing? I should have thought her too—oh, too splendid, removed—you know what I mean.”
“I don’t suppose she talked about it,” said Anita coldly. “She was not of your generation.” And then, to the others—“I assure you, this letter shook me. Even I never dreamed of this side of her. Listen.” She read aloud in her measured voice—