A letter lay on the table beside my plate. It was addressed to me. I picked it up and, holding the envelope in my left hand, with the first finger of my right hand I tore open the flap. I then withdrew the enclosure and, standing with my back to the window so that the light fell on to the written sheet, I read it.
It was from my sister, my little sister Clare, and it told me that she was engaged to be married. My sister, my little sister Clare, engaged to be married, and to a partner in a firm of publishers of all people! Here was news indeed! I own that Clare's publisher interested me very much more than Martha's policeman.
I remember nothing more until I looked up a few moments later to see a robin once again upon my window-ledge. I would not swear that it was the same bird, but, feeling that one robin was as good as another, I told it all about Clare's publisher and what this might mean to all of us.
Some days later I came down to breakfast, to find another letter lying on the table beside my plate. This letter also was addressed to me. Having gone through much the same process as that used with regard to my earlier correspondence, I discovered that this was from Clare's _fiancé_. He thanked me for my very kind congratulations of the 13th ultimo, and went on to say that, with regard to the latter part of my letter, he was not quite sure exactly what an idyll might be, and so my interesting description of my embryo book conveyed little to him. Even so, he went on, he would have been honoured to publish any book written by any relative of his dear Clare, but that he dealt, to be candid, exclusively in legal text-books.
To Martha, entering at this moment, I confessed that there was at least this to be said for her and her man, that they had never concealed their connection with that odious thing, the Law.
Later, I read an extract from my manuscript aloud to the robin. He wore an air of abstraction and I could see that his thoughts were running on other matters more immediately concerned with his own interests.
To me the robin is a peculiarly human bird.
_REVUES_ AND THINGS. _Park Lane._ _January 31st._
DEAREST DAPHNE,--I've been putting in quite a pleasant little time down at Much Gaddington with Bosh and Wee-Wee. Theatricals were the order of the night, and the best thing we did was a _revue_ written for us by the Rector of Much Gaddington, who's a perfectly sweet man and immensely clever. It's a better _revue_ than _any_ of those at the theatres, and as that dreadful Censor had, of course, nothing to do with it the dear rector could make it as snappy as he liked. Wee-Wee and I were two "plume girls," Sal and Nan, in aprons, you know, and feathers and boots stitched with white; and our duet, "Biff along, Old Sport!" with a pavement dance between the verses, fairly brought down the house. The rector himself was _impayable_ in his songs, "Wink to me only," and "Tango--Tangoing--Tangone!" But the outstanding feature of the whole affair was certainly Dick Flummery, who introduced his new and sensational _Danse à trois Jambes_, entirely his own invention!