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296 The débris of all these papers he caused to be removed by the housemaid, and this was hardly done when his wife came in from the Green.

“I thought there was a chimney on fire, Robert,” she said. “You would have liked it to be the kitchen-chimney as you said the other day.”

“Stuff and nonsense, my dear,” said he. “Lunch-time, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Ah, there’s the post. None for me, and two for you.”

She looked at him narrowly as he took his letters. Perhaps their subconscious minds (according to her dear friend’s theory) held communication, but only the faintest unintelligible ripple of that appeared on the surface.

“I haven’t heard from my Princess since she went away,” she remarked.

Robert gave a slight start; he was a little off his guard from the reaction after his anxiety.

“Indeed!” he said. “Have you written to her?”

She appeared to try to remember.

“Well, I really don’t believe I have,” she said. “That is remiss of me. I must send her a long budget one of these days.”

This time he looked narrowly at her. Had she a secret, he wondered, as well as he? What could it be?...

Georgie found his mission none too easy, and it was only the thought that it was a labour of love, or something very like it, that enabled him to persevere. Even then for the first few minutes he thought it might prove love’s labour’s lost, so bright and unreal was Lucia.