Elfrida ate two of her Banbury cakes with the malediction
that only this British confection can inspire, and bestowed
the rest upon a small boy who eyed her enviously over
the back of an adjoining seat She and the small boy and
his mother had the carriage to themselves.
There was nothing from the unusual Australian contributor
in this number of the _St. George's_, and Elfrida turned
its pages with the bored feeling of knowing what else
she might expect. "Parliamentary Debates," of course,
and the news of London, five lines from America announcing
the burning of a New York hotel with hideous loss of
life, an article on the situation in Persia, and one on
the cultivation of artichokes, "Money," "The Seer of
Hawarden," the foreign markets--book reviews. Elfrida
thought also that she knew what she might expect here,
and that it would be nothing very absorbing. Still, with
a sense of tasting criticism in advance, she let her eye
travel over the column or two the paper devoted to three
or four books of the week. A moment later Janet Cardiff's
name in the second paragraph had sprung at her throat,
it seemed to Elfrida, and choked her.
She could not see--she could not see! The print was so
bad, the light was infernal, the carriage jolted so.
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