Page:HG Wells--secret places of the heart.djvu/205

Rh For to Mr. Gunter Lake it seemed there could be no lovelier thing in life than a wife “in name only” slowly warmed into a glow of passion by the steadfast devotion and the strength and wisdom of a mate at first despised. Until at last a day would come....

“My darling!” Mr. Gunter Lake whispered to the darkness. “My little guurl. It has been worth the waiting....”

Miss Grammont met Sir Richmond in the bureau of the Old George with a telegram in her hand. “My father reported his latitude and longitude by wireless last night. The London people think he will be off Falmouth in four days’ time. He wants me to join his liner there and go on to Cherbourg and Paris. He’s arranged that. He is the sort of man who can arrange things like that. There’ll be someone at Falmouth to look after us and put us aboard the liner. I must wire them where I can pick up a telegram to-morrow.”

“Wells in Somerset,” said Sir Richmond.

His plans were already quite clear. He explained that he wanted her first to see Shaftesbury, a little old Wessex town that was three or four hundred years older than Salisbury, perched on a hill, a Saxon town, where Alfred had gathered his forces against the Danes and where Canute,