It was
not fit to be written."
"I think you are speaking of your own friend, Barbara Grant?" said
I.
"There will not be anything as bitter as to lose a fancied friend,"
said she, quoting my own expression.
"I think it is sometimes the friendship that was fancied!" I cried.
"What kind of justice do you call this, to blame me for some words
that a tomfool of a madcap lass has written down upon a piece of
paper? You know yourself with what respect I have behaved--and
would do always."
"Yet you would show me that same letter!" says she. "I want no
such friends. I can be doing very well, Mr. Balfour, without her--
or you."
"This is your fine gratitude!" says I.
"I am very much obliged to you," said she. "I will be asking you
to take away your--letters." She seemed to choke upon the word, so
that it sounded like an oath.
"You shall never ask twice," said I; picked up that bundle, walked
a little way forward and cast them as far as possible into the sea.
For a very little more I could have cast myself after them.
The rest of the day I walked up and down raging.
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