If the maid came before Brown returned she'd flee. If Brown came
back before the maid arrived she'd tell him plainly what she had decided
on, thank him, tell him kindly but with decision that, considering the
incredible circumstances of their encounter, she must decline to
encourage any hope he might entertain of ever again seeing her.
At this stern resolve her heart, being an automatic and independent
affair, refused to approve, and began an unpleasantly irregular series of
beats which annoyed her.
"It is true," she admitted to herself, "that he is a gentleman, and I can
scarcely be rude enough, after what he has done for me, to leave him
without any explanation at all.... His clothes are ruined. I must
remember that."
Her heart seemed to approve such sentiments, and it beat more regularly
as she seated herself at a desk, found in it a sheet of notepaper and a
pencil, and wrote rapidly:
"_Dear Mr. Brown:_
"If my maid comes before you do I am going. I can't help it. The maid
will stay to look after Clarence until I can return with some of the
family. I don't mean to be rude, but I simply cannot stand what you told
me about our--about what you told me.... I'm sorry you tore your clothes.
"Please believe my flight has nothing to do with you personally or your
conduct, which was perfectly ('charming' scratched out) proper. It is
only that to be suddenly told that one is predestined to ('marry'
scratched out) become intimately acquainted (all this scratched out and a
new line begun).
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