Part 80 (2/2)

'I am sorry I saw them only once, but no doubt you thought it better to let the acquaintance end there.'

'I really didn't think of it in that way at all,' Jasper replied.'We naturally understood it so, when you even ceased to call, yourself.'

'But don't you feel that there would have been a good deal of awkwardness in my coming to Mrs Yule's?'

'Seeing that you looked at things from my husband's point of view?'

'Oh, that's a mistake! I have only seen your husband once since he went to Islington.'

Amy gave him a look of surprise.

'You are not on friendly terms with him?'

'Well, we have drifted apart. For some reason he seemed to think that my companions.h.i.+p was not very profitable. So it was better, on the whole, that I should see neither you nor him.'

Amy was wondering whether he had heard of her legacy. He might have been informed by a Wattleborough correspondent, even if no one in London had told him.

'Do your sisters keep up their friends.h.i.+p with my cousin Marian?' she asked, quitting the previous difficult topic.

'Oh yes!' He smiled. 'They see a great deal of each other.'

'Then of course you have heard of my uncle's death?'

'Yes. I hope all your difficulties are now at an end.'

Amy delayed a moment, then said: 'I hope so,' without any emphasis.

'Do you think of spending this winter abroad?'

It was the nearest he could come to a question concerning the future of Amy and her husband.

'Everything is still quite uncertain. But tell me something about our old acquaintances. How does Mr Biffen get on?'

'I scarcely ever see him, but I think he pegs away at an interminable novel, which no one will publish when it's done. Whelpdale I meet occasionally.'

He talked of the latter's projects and achievements in a lively strain.

'Your own prospects continue to brighten, no doubt,' said Amy.

'I really think they do. Things go fairly well. And I have lately received a promise of very valuable help.'

'From whom?'

'A relative of yours.'

Amy turned to interrogate him with a look.

'A relative? You mean--?'

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