that her mother had once loved, once lost, once suffered.
She did not believe that her mother knew anything
of love -- of real love, of true love, of such love
as now bound herself to Jervis Blake.

Her mother no doubt supposed Rose's friendship
with Jervis Blake to be like her own friendship with
Major Guthrie -- a cold, sensible, placid affair. In
fact, she had said, with a smile, "It's rather amusing,
isn't it, that Jervis should write to you, and Major
Guthrie to me, by the same post?"

But neither mother nor daughter had offered to
show her postcard to the other. There was so little
on them that it had not seemed necessary. Of the two,
it was Mrs. Otway who felt a little shy. The wording
of Major Guthrie's postcard was so peculiar! Of
course he did not know French well, or he would have
put what he wanted to say differently. He would have
said "you" instead of "thee." She was rather glad
that her dear little Rose had not asked to see it. Still,
its arrival mollified her sore, hurt feeling that he might
have written before. Instead of tearing it up, as she
had always done the letters Major Guthrie had written
to her in the old days that now seemed so very long
ago, she slipped that curious war postcard inside the
envelope in which were placed his bank-notes.

[[171]]

p170 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p171w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p172

v?