holding tight in his
hand Jenny's letter, written to him in June. The bill he had not even
troubled to open.

For the letter said exactly and perfectly just all those things which
he most wished to hear, in the manner in which he wished to hear them.
It laughed at him gently and kindly; it called him an extraordinarily
silly boy; it said that his leaving Cambridge, and, above all, his
manner of leaving it--Frank had added a postscript describing his
adventure with the saddle and the policeman--were precisely what the
writer would have expected of him; it made delightful and humorous
reflections upon the need of Frank's turning over a new leaf--there was
quite a page of good advice; and finally it gave him a charming
description--just not over the line of due respect--of his father's
manner of receiving the news, with extracts from some of the choicest
remarks made upon that notable occasion. It occupied four
closely-written pages, and if there were, running underneath it
all, just the faintest taint of strain and anxiety, loyally
concealed--well--that made the letter no less pleasant.

I have not said a great deal about what Jenny meant to Frank, just
because he said so very little about her himself. She was, in fact,
almost the only element in his variegated life upon which he had not
been in the habit of pouring out torrential comments and reflections.
His father and Archie were not at all spared in his conversation with
his most intimate friends; in fact, he had been known, more than once,
in a very select circle at Cambridge, to have conducted imaginary
dialogues between those two on himself as their subject, and he could
imitate with remarkable fidelity his Cousin Dick over a billiard-table.
But he practically never mentioned Jenny; he had not even a photograph
of her on his mantelpiece. And it very soon became known among his
friends, when the news of his engagement leaked out through Jack, that
it was not to be spoken of in his presence. He had preserved the same
reticence, it may be remembered, about his religion.

And so Frank at last fell asleep on a little iron bedstead, just
remembering that it was quite possible he might have another letter from
her to-morrow, if Jack had performed his commission immediately. But he
hardly expected to hear till Tuesday.

* * * * *

Gertie was up soon after five next morning to get breakfast for her men,
since the Major had announced that