"Mr. Wade hopes that Miss Damer will excuse him from his engagement to
skate with her this afternoon. The ice is dangerous, and Miss Damer
should on no account venture upon it."
Perry Purtett was the bearer of this billet. He swaggered into Peter
Skerrett's hall, and dreadfully alarmed the fresh-imported Englishman
who answered the bell, by ordering him in a severe tone,--
"Hurry up now, White Cravat, with that answer! I'm wanted down to the
Works. Steam don't bile when I'm off; and the fly-wheel will never buzz
another turn, unless I'm there to motion it to move on."
Mrs. Damer's gracious reply informed Wade "that she should be charmed to
see him at dinner, etc., and would not fail to transmit his kind warning
to Miss Damer, when she returned from her drive to make calls."
But when Miss Damer returned in the afternoon, her mother was taking a
gentle nap over the violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange, red
stripes of a gorgeous Afghan she was knitting. The daughter heard
nothing of the billet. The house was lonely without Fanny Skerrett. Mr.
Wade did not come at the appointed hour. Mary was not--willing to say to
herself how much she regretted his absence.
Had he forgotten the appointment?
No,--that was a thought not to be tolerated.
"A gentleman does not forget," she thought. And she had a thorough
confidence, besides, that this gentleman was very willing to remember.
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