Delia also reassured her; she said she’d see to it that poppa didn’t sneak round. She communicated to her indeed that he hadn’t the smallest doubt that Gaston, in a few days, would blow them up--all THEM down there--much higher than they had blown her, and that he was very sorry he had let her go down herself on that sort of summons. It was for her and the rest to come to Francie and to him, and if they had anything practical to say they’d arrive in a body yet. If Mr. Dosson had the sense of his daughter’s having been roughly handled he derived some of the consolation of amusement from his persistent humorous view of the Proberts as a “body.” If they were consistent with their character or with their complaint they would move en masse upon the hotel, and he hung about at home a good deal as if to wait for them. Delia intimated to her sister that this vision cheered them up as they sat, they two, in the red salon while Francie was in bed. Of course it didn’t exhilarate this young lady, and she even looked for no brighter side now. She knew almost nothing but her sharp little ache of suspense, her presentiment of Gaston’s horror, which grew all the while. Delia remarked to her once that he would have seen lots of society-papers over there, he would have become familiar; but this only suggested to the girl--she had at present strange new moments and impulses of quick reasoning--that they would only prepare him to be disgusted, not to be indifferent. His disgust would be colder than anything she had ever known and would complete her knowledge of him--make her understand him properly for the first time. She would just meet it as briefly as possible; it would wind up the business, close the incident, and all would be over. He didn’t write; that proved it in advance; there had now been two or three mails without a letter. He had seen the paper in Boston or in New York and it had simply struck him dumb. It was very well for Delia to say that of course he didn’t write when he was on the ocean: how could they get his letters even if he did? There had been time before--before he sailed; though Delia represented that people never wrote then. They were ever so much too busy at the last and were going to see their correspondents in a few days anyway. The only missives that came to Francie were a copy of the Reverberator, addressed in Mr. Flack’s hand and with a great inkmark on the margin of the fatal letter, and three intense pages from Mme. de Brecourt, received forty-eight hours after the scene at her house. This lady expressed herself as follows: