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The formalities of the wedding or rather ratification of a previous union being concluded, the four went in one cab to Raye's lodgings, newly taken in a new suburb in preference to a house, the rent of which he could ill afford just then. Here Anna cut the little cake which Raye had bought at a pastrycook's on his way home from Lincoln's Inn the night before. But she did not do much besides.
Although she had written to Raye so short a time previously, she instantly penned another Anna-note hinting clearly though delicately the state of affairs. Raye replied by a hasty line to say how much he was affected by her news: he felt that he must run down to see her almost immediately.
This letter it had been which Raye had received and delighted in. Written in the presence of Anna it certainly was, and on Anna's humble note-paper, and in a measure indited by the young girl; but the life, the spirit, the individuality, were Edith Harnham's. 'Won't you at least put your name yourself? she said. 'You can manage to write that by this time? 'No, no, said Anna, shrinking back.
Then in his slow, drawling manner, he told us that the command of the Tuitoga had been given to an ex-lieutenant of the navy, whose knowledge of sailing vessels was confined to his youthful experiences on one of the service training brigs; but King George of Tonga was anxious to secure an English naval officer to command the new ship, and out of some hundreds of eager applicants, Lieutenant Raye had been selected.
La Meff raye!" they seemed to wail, with a curious swelling upon the last syllable. "I hear only the yelling of the infernal brutes," said the Lord James; "they seem to be calling on their patron saint the woman whom we saw in the house of the poor cripple. I am sure I saw her going to and fro among the devils and encouraging them to the assault."
In the natural order of things Raye would have arrived at the latter place on Monday afternoon; but it was not till the middle of Wednesday that his gown and grey wig, curled in tiers, in the best fashion of Assyrian bas-reliefs, were seen blowing and bobbing behind him as he hastily walked up the High Street from his lodgings.
For the first time since Raye's visit Anna had gone to stay over a night or two with her cottage friends on the Plain, and in her absence had arrived, out of its time, a letter from Raye. To this Edith had replied on her own responsibility, from the depths of her own heart, without waiting for her maid's collaboration.
'But you must concentrate your attention on writing your name as I write it here. Soon Raye wrote about the wedding. Having decided to make the best of what he feared was a piece of romantic folly, he had acquired more zest for the grand experiment. He wished the ceremony to be in London, for greater privacy. Edith Harnham would have preferred it at Melchester; Anna was passive.
The hostel of the Ane Raye poured from its upper and lower windows a flood of light into the gathering August dusk. It stood, a little withdrawn among its beeches, at a cross-roads, where the main route southward from the Valois cut the highway from Paris to Rheims and Champagne.
'I wish it was mine I wish it was! she murmured. 'Yet how can I say such a wicked thing! The letter moved Raye considerably when it reached him. The intelligence itself had affected him less than her unexpected manner of treating him in relation to it.
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