Scales's tone had changed; it had thrilled her. "You are YOU," it
had said, "there is you--and there is the rest of the universe!"
Then he had not forgotten; she had lived in his heart; she had not
for three months been the victim of her own fancies! ... She saw
him put a piece of folded white paper on the top edge of the
screening box and flick it down to her. She blushed scarlet,
staring at it as it lay on the counter. He said nothing, and she
could not speak. ... He had prepared that paper, then, beforehand,
on the chance of being able to give it to her! This thought was
exquisite but full of terror. "I must really go," he had said,
lamely, with emotion in his voice, and he had gone--like that! And
she put the piece of paper into the pocket of her apron, and
hastened away. She had not even seen, as she turned up the stairs,
her mother standing by the till--that spot which was the conning-
tower of the whole shop. She ran, ran, breathless to the bedroom.
"I am a wicked girl!" she said quite frankly, on the road to the
rendezvous. "It is a dream that I am going to meet him. It cannot
be true. There is time to go back. If I go back I am safe. I have
simply called at Miss Chetwynd's and she wasn't in, and no one can
say a word.
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