Miss Bruce-Pringle (The Pretext)

Miss Bruce-Pringle is also a character that is only mentioned and does not actually appear in the short story. The only known fact about her is that she took "a course in histology at the Annex” (Lewis, 1968, p. 647). She is at the Bunce’s (in England) to have some tea with them and a friend of Mrs. Margaret Ransom who is in England on a holiday while the short story takes place. She seems to know the Ransoms because she asks about them and then tells the friend of Mrs. Margaret Ransom about the dissolved engagement of Guy Dawnish and Gwendolen Matcher (Lewis, 1968, p. 647). Without the meeting of Miss Bruce-Pringle and the friend of Mrs. Margaret Ransom the news would not have been delivered to America.

Source:

Lewis, R. W. B. (1968). The Collected Short Stories of Edith Wharton. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.