That was quite true, Grizel admitted to herself.  In all her recollections of Tommy she could not remember one critical moment in which Elspeth had not been foremost in his thoughts.  It passed through her head, “Even now he must make sure that Elspeth is in peace of mind before he can care to triumph over me,” and she would perhaps have felt less bitter had he put his triumph first.

His triumph!  Oh, she would show him whether it was a triumph.  He had destroyed for ever her faith in David Gemmell.  The quiet, observant doctor, who had such an eye for the false, had been deceived as easily as all the others, and it made her feel very lonely.  But never mind; Tommy should find out, and that within the hour, that there was one whom he could not cheat.  Her first impulse, always her first impulse, was to go straight to his side and tell him what she thought of him.  Her second, which was neater, was to send by messenger her compliments to Mr. and Miss Sandys, and would they, if not otherwise engaged, come and have tea with her that afternoon?  Not a word in the note about the ankle, but a careful sentence to the effect that she had seen Dr. Gemmell to-day, and proposed asking him to meet them.

Maggy Ann, who had conveyed the message, came back with the reply.  Elspeth regretted that they could not accept Grizel’s invitation, owing to the accident to her brother being very much more serious than Grizel seemed to think.  “I can’t understand,” Elspeth added, “why Dr. Gemmell did not tell you this when he saw you.”

“Is it a polite letter?” asked inquisitive Maggy Ann, and Grizel assured her that it was most polite.  “I hardly expected it,” said the plain-spoken dame, “for I’m thinking by their manner it’s more than can be said of yours.”

“I merely invited them to come to tea.”

“And him wi’ his leg broke!  Did you no ken he was lying on chairs?”

“I did not know it was so bad as that, Maggy Ann.  So my letter seemed to annoy him, did it?” said Grizel, eagerly, and, I fear, well pleased.

“It angered her most terrible,” said Maggy Ann, “but no him.  He gave a sort of a laugh when he read it.”

“A laugh!”

“Ay, and syne she says, ’It is most heartless of Grizel; she does not even ask how you are to-day; one would think she did not know of the accident’; and she says, ’I have a good mind to write her a very stiff letter.’  And says he in a noble, melancholic voice, ’We must not hurt Grizel’s feelings,’ he says.  And she says, ’Grizel thinks it was nothing because you bore it so cheerfully; oh, how little she knows you!’ she says; and ‘You are too forgiving,’ she says.  And says he, ‘If I have anything to forgive Grizel for, I forgive her willingly.’  And syne she quieted down and wrote the letter.”

Forgive her!  Oh, how it enraged Grizel!  How like the Tommy of old to put it in that way.  There never had been a boy so good at forgiving people for his own crimes, and he always looked so modest when he did it.  He was reclining on his chairs at this moment, she was sure he was, forgiving her in every sentence.  She could have endured it more easily had she felt sure that he was seeing himself as he was; but she remembered him too well to have any hope of that.