How little a time had passed between the moment when she was greeting him joyously in Caddam Wood and that cry of the heart, "How could you hurt your Grizel so!" No, she could not open her letter.

She could kiss it, but she could not open it.
Foolish fears! for before she had shaken hands with Tommy in Mrs.
McLean's garden she knew he loved her still, and that the letter proved it.

She was properly punished, yet surely in excess, for when she might have been reading her first love-letter, she had to join in discussions with various ladies about Berlin wool and the like, and to applaud the prowess of Mr.James with the loathly croquet mallet.

It seemed quite a long time before Tommy could get a private word with her.

Then he began about the letter at once.
"You are not angry with me for writing it ?" he asked anxiously.