I wish I could stay, but Edmond and his artist may kill my new butler unless I intervene.

They are both hotly pro-Ally.

By the way, I hear that Alice Palgrave has gone to the Maine coast with her mother, who is ill again; I wonder where Gilbert is going ?" "Well, I had a very charming letter from him two days ago, asking me if he could come and stay with us.

He loves this house and the beach, and I always cheer him up, he said, and he is very lonely without Alice.

Of course I said yes, and he will be here this afternoon." Whereupon, having landed her fish, Mrs.Jekyll rose to go.