“Oh, Evie!”

Miriam went back, like a person defeated, to the chair from which she had just risen, while Evie buried herself in the depths of a closet, where she remained long enough, as she hoped, to let Miriam’s first astonishment subside.  On coming out she assumed a virtuous tone.

“You see now why I simply had to break with Billy.  I couldn’t possibly keep the two things going together—­as some girls would.  I’m one of those who do right, whatever happens.  It’s very hard for me—­but if people would only be a little more sympathetic—­”

It was some minutes before Miriam knew just what to say.  Even when she began to speak she doubted her capacity for making herself understood.

“Evie darling,” she said, trying to speak as for a child’s comprehension, “this is a very serious matter.  I don’t think you realize how serious it is.  If you find you don’t love Billy well enough, of course you must ask him to release you.  I should be sorry for that, but I shouldn’t blame you.  But until you’ve done it you can’t give your word to any one.”

“Well, I must say I never heard anything like that,” Evie declared, indignantly.  “You do have the strangest ideas, Miriam.  Dear mamma used to say so, too.  I try to defend you, but you make it difficult for me, I must say.  I never knew any one like you for making things more complicated than they need be.  You talk of my asking Billy to release me when I released myself long ago—­in my own mind.  That’s where I have to look.  I must do things according to my conscience—­and when that’s clear—­”

“It isn’t only a case of conscience, dear; it’s one of common sense.  Conscience has a way of sometimes mistaking the issue, whereas common sense can generally be trusted to be right.”

“Of course, if you’re going to talk that way, Miriam, I don’t see what’s left for me to answer; but it doesn’t sound very reverent, I must say.  I’m trying to look at things in the highest light, and it doesn’t strike me as the highest light to be unkind to Billy when I needn’t be.  If you think I ought to treat him cruelly you must keep your opinion, but I know you’ll excuse me if I keep mine.”

She carried her head loftily as she bore another gown into the adjoining darkness, and Miriam waited patiently till she emerged again.

“Does your other—­I hardly know what to call him—­does your other fiancA(C) know about Billy?”

“Why on earth should he?  What good would that do?  It will be all over—­I mean about Billy—­before I announce my second engagement, and as the one to Billy will never be announced at all there’s no use in saying anything about it.”

“But suppose Billy himself finds out?”

“Billy won’t find out anything whatever until I get ready to let him.”

The finality of this retort reduced Miriam to silence.  She allowed some minutes to pass before saying, with some hesitation: