Eleanor said she had a little cold.  “Cold?” said Mrs. Newbolt.  “My gracious! don’t come near me!  I used to tell your dear uncle I was more afraid of a cold than I was of Satan!  He said a cold was Satan; and I said—­” Eleanor hung up the receiver.

So she was alone—­and the wind blew, and the straws and leaves danced over that battlefield of her empty mind, and she said: 

“I’ll give him Jacky,” and then she said, “Our river.”  And then she said, “But I must hurry!” He had written that he might reach home by the end of the week.  “He might come to-night!  I must do it—­before he comes home.”  She said that while the March dawn was gray against the windows of her bedroom, and the house was still.  She lay in bed until, at six, she heard the creak of the attic stairs and Mary’s step as she crept down to the kitchen, the silver basket clattering faintly on her arm.  Then she rose and dressed; once she paused to look at herself in the glass:  those gray hairs! ...  Edith had called his attention to them so many years ago!  It was a long time since it had been worth while to pull them out. ...  All that morning she moved about the house like one in a dream.  She was thinking what she would say in her letter to him, and wondering, now and then, vaguely, what it would be like, afterward?  She ate no luncheon, though she sat down at the table.  She just crumbled up a piece of bread; then rose, and went into the library to Maurice’s desk...  She sat there for a long time, making idle scratches on the blotting paper; her elbow on the desk, her forehead in her hand, she sat and scrawled his initials—­and hers—­and his.  And then, after about an hour, she wrote: 

...  I want you to have Jacky.  When I am dead you can get him, because you can marry Lily.  Of course I oughtn’t to have married you, but—­

Here she paused for a long time.

I loved you.  I’d rather she didn’t call you Maurice.  But I want you to have Jacky; so marry her, and you will have him.  I am not jealous, you see.  You won’t call me jealous any more, will you?  And, besides, I love little Jacky, too.  See that he has music lessons.

Another pause...  Many thoughts...  Many straws and dead leaves...  “Edith will never enter the house, if Lily is here—­with Jacky....  Oh—­I hate her.”

You will believe I love you, won’t you, darling?  I wish I hadn’t married you; I didn’t mean to do you any harm.  I just loved you, and I thought I could make you happy.  I know now that I didn’t.  Forgive me, darling, for marrying you...

Again a long pause....

I don’t mind dying at all, if I can give you what you want.  And I don’t mind your marrying Lily.  I am sure she can make good cake—­tell her to try that chocolate cake you liked so much.  I tried it twice, but it was heavy.  I forgot the baking powder.  Make her call you “Mr. Curtis.”  Oh, Maurice—­you will believe I love you?—­even if I am—­