'I have no great faith in my influence with him, but I will do my very best. You may rely on that.' 'You will stay for dinner? We dine at six.' 'I shall be very glad if you will allow me to dine with you; but first I'll run over to The Falcon for a moment, just to counter-order a dinner there. I shall be back before six.' He left the house without meeting George. He went straight to that dreary little railway station. The day was raw and wet, and cold and miserable, and the railway station is one of the bleakest in England. To him the day was full of light and gaiety. When he reached the miserable telegraph-office he smiled at the damp-looking clerk. The damp-looking clerk did not smile at him. No man in a normal state of mind could smile on a wet winter's day at the Stratford railway station. Nevill took up a telegraph form, and put down his own name boldly. Then he wrote 'Miss Osborne, care of Mrs Barclay, Peter's Row, London, E.C.,' with great distinctness and care, touching and retouching the letters of her name caressingly. Then bit elaborately, and carefully inspected, the end of his pencil. Meanwhile the damp-looking clerk faced him with the expression of a martyr to electricity and suppressed catarrh. Nevill's was not an ordinary case. He was addressing his first telegram to her who now he had good reason to think would become his future wife. It was in the nature of his position he should feel strongly, tenderly, hopefully. But how was a man to be strong and tender and hopeful in the presence of this damp clerk? the knowledge that this damp clerk would read the message, and send it over a hundred miles of damp wires to London, where it would again be read? What should he say? For a moment he thought he would not telegraph at all; and then he thought that would look very like treating Kate carelessly, and surely nothing in the world was further from his desire than to treat Kate carelessly. 'Well, he couldn't stand there all day staring at that man. The clerk looked as if he would as soon stand there all day as not; nothing being of any interest to him. At last Nevill resolved upon the simplest form, words that could bring no meaning to anyone who had not the clue. The message ran:-- 'I have had a most satisfactory interview. Nothing could have been kinder. I will write. I dine there this evening.' As soon as this had been handed in, Nevill returned to The Falcon, countermanded the dinner, and strolled back to Osborne's. The dinner passed over without any incident of consequence. Mrs Osborne was grave, and George dull. Nevill's happiness spoiled his natural free extravagance, and Alice, who now knew what the stranger had come about, sat lost in wonder and dismay before the proof of Kate's bad taste.