Artists -- Fiction; British -- France -- Paris -- Fiction; Man-woman relationships -- Fiction; Young women -- Fiction
I am very glad we are good friends again, and I should like to tell
you everything that has happened. (_After you, after he--when my
step-father_). After the last time I saw you (_I was very unhappy
because I wanted to go to Paris_) I was very anxious to go to Paris
because of what you had said. My aunt came down and was very kind.
(_She told me_) She persuaded my step-father to let me go. I think
(_we_) he was glad to get rid of me, for (_somehow_) he never did
care about me, any more than I did about him. There are a great many
(_other_) things that he does not understand. Of course I was wild
with joy and thought of nothing but (_what you_) work, and my aunt
brought me over. But I did not see anything of Paris then. We went
straight on to Joinville where Madame Gautier has a villa, and
(_we_) my aunt left me there, and went to Norway. It was all very
strange at first, but I liked it. Madame Gautier is very strict; it
was like being at school. Sometimes I almost (_forgot_) fancied that
I was at school again. There were three other girls besides me, and
we had great fun. The Professor was very nice and encouraging. He is
very old. So is everybody who comes to the house--(_but_) it
(_was_) is jolly, because when there are four of you everything is
so interesting. We used to have picnics in the woods, and take it in
turn to ride in the donkey-cart. And there were musical evenings
with the Pastor and the Avocat and their wives. It was very amusing
sometimes. Madame Gautier had let her Paris flat, so we stayed at
Joinville till a week ago, and then my Aunt walked in one day and
took me to Paris for a week. I did enjoy that. And now aunt has
gone, and Madame Gautier is taking the inventory and getting the
keys, and presently she will come for me, I shall go with her to the
Rue Vaugirard, Number 62. It will be very nice seeing the other
girls again and telling them all about (_everything_) my week in
Paris. I am so sorry that I shall not have the pleasure of seeing
you again, but I am glad we met--because I do not like to think my
friends do not trust me.
Yours sincerely,
Betty Desmond.
That was the letter which Betty posted. But the first letter she wrote
was quite different. It began:
"You don't know, you never will know what it is to me to know that
you did not deceive me. My dear friend, my only friend! And how I
treated you yesterday! And how nobly you forgave me. I shall see you
again. I must see you again. No one else has ever understood me."
And so on to the "True and constant friend Betty."
She burned this letter.
"The other must go," she said, "that's the worst of life. If I sent
the one that's really written as I feel he'd think I was in love with
him or some nonsense. But a child who was just in two syllables might
have written the other. So _that's_ all right."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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