Scrap of a letter, found by Vellance loose in the blotter of the morning-room writing-table, undated, almost certainly 30 or 31 March 1923
A single half-sheet, no letterhead, in a slanting masculine hand. The upper portion has been torn away. The remaining text reads, in full:
— for the inconvenience of the Charing Cross arrangement, but I am in town for that one day only and shall not be again before Whitsuntide. Wednesday the eleventh, then, at four, in the gentlemen's smoking room of the hotel; if you will be so good as to bring the box up unaccompanied, I will have the bank order ready and the matter need detain neither of us more than the quarter hour.
I need hardly say that the discretion you have requested is also my own. The plant, once with me, becomes a private specimen of no particular history and no especial registered name; I should be obliged if your own letters to me on the subject were burnt at receipt as those to you have been.
If anything should prevent the meeting, a wire to the club before midday will reach me.
Believe me, very truly yours,
— H. Penrose
Vellance annotation in pencil at the foot, 9th iv: Found this morning while clearing the blotter of the writing-table which I last cleared on the Friday night before her arrival. M.V.