It was next morning, whilst Jane was sorting and arranging the papers for the library table, that she caught sight of Henry’s first message. She very nearly missed it, for the fold of the paper cut right across the agony column, and what caught her eye was the one word that passed as a signature, “Thursday.” It startled her so much that she dropped the paper, and, in snatching at it, knocked over a pile of magazines. Lady Heritage looked over her shoulder with a frown, tapped with her foot, and then went on with her writing in a silence that uttered more reproof than words could have done. Jane picked everything up as silently as possible. As she put the papers on the table, she laid _The Times_ out flat, and, bending over it, read the message: “You will receive a letter from me. Trust the bearer. Thursday.” She put all the papers neatly in their places, and went to her writing-table with an intense longing to be alone, to be able to think what this might mean, and to wonder who—who would be the bearer of Henry’s letter. She hoped ardently that Lady Heritage would have business in the laboratories, and whilst these thoughts, and hopes, and wonderings filled her mind, she had to write neat and legible replies to the apparently inexhaustible number of persons who desired Lady Heritage to open bazaars, speak at public meetings, subscribe to an indefinite number of charities, or contribute to the writer’s support. When, at last, she was alone in her own room, she was tingling with excitement. At any moment some one, some unknown friend and ally, might present himself. It was exciting, but, she thought, rather risky. For instance, supposing Henry’s letter came, by any mischance, into the wrong hands—and letters were mislaid and stolen sometimes—what a perfectly dreadful chapter of misfortunes might ensue. She frowned, and decided that Henry had been rash. It was with a pleasant feeling of superiority that she put on her hat and went out into the garden to pick tulips. The weather had changed in the night, and it was hot and sunny, with the sudden dazzling heat of mid-April. In the walled garden the south border was full of violet-scented yellow tulips, each looking at this new hot sun with a jet-black eye. A sheet of forget-me-nots repeated the sheer blue of the sky. Jane picked an armful of tulips and a sheaf of leopard’s bane. Strictly speaking, she should then have gone in to put the flowers in water for the adornment of the Yellow Drawing-Room. Instead, she made her way to the farthest corner of the garden and basked. At first she looked at the flowers, but after a while her eyelids fell.