till you direct the envelope, and I'll go with you to the post, and I'll
see you put the letter in the box. If you and your fine Colonel Morris
think you can frighten or flatter me, you are both much mistaken, I can
tell you that!"

I did not answer her. I was too greatly affronted to express what I felt
in words. I sat on the other side of the table--for I would not leave
her alone in Mr. Craven's office--sulking, while she wrote her letter,
which she did in a great, fat, splashing sort of hand, with every other
word underlined; and when she had done, and tossed the missive over to
me, I directed it, took my hat, and prepared to accompany her to the
Charing Cross office.

We went down the staircase together in silence, up Buckingham Street,
across the Strand, and so to Charing Cross, where she saw me drop the
letter into the box. All this time we did not exchange a syllable, but
when, after raising my hat, I was about to turn away, she seized hold of
my arm, and said, "Don't let us part in bad blood. Though you are only a
clerk, you have got your feelings, no doubt, and if in my temper I hurt
them, I am sorry. Can I say more? You are a decent lad enough, as times
go in England, and my bark is worse than my bite. I didn't write a word
about you to William Craven. Shake hands, and don't bear malice to a
poor lonely woman."

Thus exhorted, I took her hand and shook it, and then, in token of
entire amity, she told me she had forgotten to bring her purse with her
and could I let her have a sovereign. She would pay me, she declared
solemnly, the first day she came again to the office.

This of course I did not believe in the least, nevertheless I gave