But, oh,
it's awful to me. The suspense! It'll break my heart to give up North
Ride."
"Auntie," said Mavis presently; "if you chance upon Will, don't speak
to him."
"Why not?"
She whispered the answer. "He found out about _him_ and me."
"Oh, did he? How did he take it?"
"Awfully badly."
But Mrs. Petherick did not seem to care twopence about the domestic
trouble of Mavis and Will. Her thoughts were engrossed by her own
affairs.
"Mavis, I do think this: that if there's a will found, I shall be in
it. He wasn't a liar, whatever he was."
That night there seemed to be a tremendous lot of drunkenness in
Rodchurch, and when the Gauntlet Inn closed you could hear the
shouting as far off as the post office. But next day the village was
quietly drowsy as of old: it had got over its excitement.
Weeks passed, and for Mavis time began to glide. All things in the
post office itself had resumed their ordinary course, and she felt
instinctively that up-stairs, as well as down-stairs, a normal order
would rule again before very long. Outwardly she and Dale were just
what they used to be. They were not, however, really living as husband
and wife. She suffered, but made no complaint. All would come right.
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