One

I
“Linnet Ridgeway!”

“That’s her!” said Mr. Burnaby, the landlord of the Three Crowns.

He nudged his companion.

The two men stared with round bucolic¹ eyes and slightly open mouths.

A big scarlet² Rolls-Royce had just stopped in front of the local post office.

A girl jumped out, a girl without a hat and wearing a frock that looked (but only looked) simple.

A girl with golden hair and straight autocratic features—a girl with a lovely shape—a girl such aswas seldom seen in Malton-under-Wode.

With a quick imperative³ step she passed into the post office.

“That’s her!” said Mr. Burnaby again. And he went on in a low awed⁴ voice: “Millions she’sgot…Going to spend thousands on the place. Swimming pools there’s going to be, and Italiangardens and a ballroom⁵ and half of the house pulled down and rebuilt….”

“She’ll bring money into the town,” said his friend. He was a lean, seedy-looking man. His tonewas envious⁶ and grudging⁷.

Mr. Burnaby agreed.

“Yes, it’s a great thing for Malton-under-Wode. A great thing it is.”

Mr. Burnaby was complacent⁸ about it.

“Wake us all up proper,” he added.

“Bit of difference from Sir George,” said the other.

“Ah, it was the ’orses did for him,” said Mr. Burnaby indulgently. “Never ’ad no luck.”

“What did he get for the place?”

“A cool sixty thousand, so I’ve heard.”

The lean man whistled.

Mr. Burnaby went on triumphantly⁹: “And they say she’ll have spent another sixty thousandbefore she’s finished!”

“Wicked!” said the lean man. “Where’d she get all that money from?”

“America, so I’ve heard. Her mother was the only daughter of one of those millionaire blokes.

Quite like the pictures, isn’t it?”

The girl came out of the post office and climbed into the car.

As she drove off, the lean man followed her with his eyes. He muttered:

“It seems all wrong to me—her looking like that. Money and looks—it’s too much! If a girl’s asrich as that she’s no right to be a good-looker as well. And she is a good-looker…Got everything,that girl has. Doesn’t seem fair….”

 

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