I wished I might have taken it also, and had the will to do it but I dared not.

Besides, what right had I to such things?
Already I was trying to steel myself to destroy the one letter he had written me.

I should have no right to it when I was Richard Dawson's wife.
A shout somewhere near at hand alarmed me.

I slipped my letter under the glove on the writing-table and fled out precipitately.

Only in time, as it proved, for Terence Murphy came round the house chasing a refractory hen, which, as luck would have it, flew through the door I had left open behind me.
"I could have sworn I shut that door," I heard Terence shout at the top of his voice.