Audrey wrote and told Sister Maggie--a letter pledging her to secrecy, posted on the very moment of departure for the Continent ("at our wedding breakfast at the Charing Cross hotel, darling; and the train just going") and breathing ecstasy of happiness, and breathing love all atremble in its prayer for forgiveness. It informed Maggie that they were to be Mr. and Mrs. Redpath until everybody was told; and "O, darling Maggie, I shall not sleep until I get your letter--_Poste restante_, Paris, dear--telling me you forgive me and how glad you are."
Forgiveness was not to be discovered in the reply by the weeping eyes that read it. "You have made a most terrible mistake," Maggie wrote. "You say that you are happy, but you will find you can only be miserable while you are living in deception."
The wounding sentences were written in a firm, clear penmanship that in itself was cold and bitter reprimand. As they appeared, so Audrey read them. She did not know that they were written while the hand that made them could be steadied from its trembling desire to send a message only of devotion, only of prayer for Audrey's happiness, only of blessing. The letter brought to Audrey's eyes the tears that Maggie hoped to bring but ached to bring--forcing herself to be cruel in order to be kind; also it brought belief that Maggie was and wished to be estranged. It was never answered. Wisely intended, unwisely executed, misread, it added to the record of human perversity another of those immensely pitiful blunders that solely and alone are the cause of human unhappiness. When Heaven holds its reassembly, Heaven, as we seek out our loved, will surely ring with broken, loving greetings of: "I did not know! I did not understand!" No more will need be said. All tragedy, all sorrow is in those words; all tragedy, all sorrow removed by them.
Roly also had his letter. "If you cause her one single moment's unhappiness--" and other wild words. He did not show it to Audrey. Cause his darling unhappiness! He kissed away the tears her own letter had brought and laughingly cheered her with an amusing account of an incident in the hotel lobby. "We'll have to get out of this place, Audrey. There's a man staying here and his wife that I know well. Great pals of Gran's. I near as a toucher ran bang into them."