The Enchanted April

Contents

Chapter 1

It began in a Woman’s Club in London on a February afternoon—an uncomfortableclub, and a miserable afternoon—when Mrs. Wilkins, who had come down fromHampstead to shop and had lunched at her club, took up The Times fromthe table in the smoking-room, and running her listless eye down the AgonyColumn saw this:

To Those who Appreciate Wistaria and Sunshine. Small mediaeval Italian Castleon the shores of the Mediterranean to be Let Furnished for the month of April.Necessary servants remain. Z, Box 1000, The Times.

That was its conception; yet, as in the case of many another, the conceiver wasunaware of it at the moment.

So entirely unaware was Mrs. Wilkins that her April for that year had then andthere been settled for her that she dropped the newspaper with a gesture thatwas both irritated and resigned, and went over to the window and stareddrearily out at the dripping street.

Not for her were mediaeval castles, even those that are specially described assmall. Not for her the shores in April of the Mediterranean, and the wistariaand sunshine. Such delights were only for the rich. Yet the advertisement hadbeen addressed to persons who appreciate these things, so that it had been,anyhow, addressed too to her, for she certainly appreciated them; more thananybody knew; more than she had ever told. But she was poor. In the whole worldshe possessed of her very own only ninety pounds, saved from year to year, putby carefully pound by pound, out of her dress allowance. She had scraped thissum together at the suggestion of her husband as a shield and refuge against arainy day. Her dress allowance, given her by her father, was £100 a year, sothat Mrs. Wil

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