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Upon the very first evening she had made up her mind that Miss June Townshend was non-existent. She could have sworn that Pardoner had invented the lady, to be a foil to George Fulke. Gleefully, she had decided to turn the foil into a lash to be laid mischievously about her fiancé’s shoulders. The laborious drafting of the letter to June had afforded her the highest gratification, and her searching cross-examinations of Virgil upon his associations with the lady had never failed to bear her most refreshing fruit. Now, without a word of warning, the Palace of Fun had fallen, and out of the ruins were sticking some extremely ill-favoured truths. The very least of these was suggesting that the edifice had been erected upon a foundation of distasteful fact.

It was while she was staring at Virgil’s empty place, considering these things, that for the first time she realized something which was still more to the point. This was that with her future husband she was most heartily in love....

Pardoner walked down the hall, thinking furiously. Arrived at the box, he took the spare receiver and told the page to speak for him.