'I'm not going to make any appeal to your feelings with regard to your mother and the children, because if you had thought even of me a little this would not have happened. I'm very, very sorry for it. I believe it happened from your weakness and foolishness, or you could not have behaved with such irresponsibility, but I'm trying to look at it quite calmly. I therefore propose to do nothing at all for three months. If I acted on your suggestion you might regret it ever after. If in three months you write to me again in the same strain, still desiring to be free, I will think of it, though I'm not sure that I should do it even then. But in case you change your mind I propose to tell nobody, not even your mother. By the time you get this letter, it will be six weeks since yours to me, and you may look at things differently. Perhaps by then you will be glad to hear that I have told your mother merely that you have been ordered away for a change, and I shall say the same to anyone else who inquires for you. If you feel after this time still responsible, and that you have a certain duty, still remember, even so, you might be very unhappy together all your lives. Excuse me, then, if I don't take you at your word. 'Another point occurs to me. In your hurry and excitement, perhaps you forgot that your father's legacy depended on the condition that you should not leave the Foreign Office before you were fifty. That is about fourteen years from now. If you are legally freed, and marry Miss Argles, you could hardly go back there. I think it would be practically impossible under those circumstances, while if you live in Australia you will have hardly any means. I merely remind you of this, in case you had forgotten. 'I shall regard it all as an unfortunate aberration; and if you regret it, and change your mind, you will be free at any time you like to come back and nothing shall be ever said about it. But I'm not begging you to do so. I may be wrong; perhaps she's the woman to make you happy. Let me know within three months how you feel about it. No-one will suffer except myself during this time, as I shall keep it from your mother, and shall remain here during this time. Perhaps you will be very angry with me that I don't wish to take you at your word, Bruce. At first I thought I would, but I'm doing what I think right, and one cannot do more. 'I'm not going to reproach you, for if you don't feel the claims of others on you, my words will make no difference. 'Think over what I say. Should you be unhappy and wish to separate from her without knowing how, and if it becomes a question of money, as so many things do, I would help you. I did not remind you about your father's legacy to induce you to come back. If you really find happiness in the way you expect, we could arrange it. You see, I have thought of everything, in one night. But you _won't_ be happy. 'EDITH OTTLEY.'