A twinkle came into her husband’s eyes:  “My dear, the friend of a big millionaire always keeps some one from Boston close by.”  His arm went around her.  “Poor little girl.  I guess I won’t have to say any more—­”

“Perhaps you will and perhaps you won’t!” Now again she was nearly choking with rage and with hurt vanity.  Her one and only companion!  The only woman she had been clever enough to find!  That kind!  Oh-h!  Suddenly she turned to Joe to tell him that if he could give her no friends she’d pick and choose just where she liked!  But quickly she remembered that he would answer, “Haven’t I tried?” She turned away, broke into tears and left the room.

Out of the little storm that followed, she emerged at last with the thought, “Well, I must see her, anyway, in the work of moving into her apartment.  And am I sorry?  Not at all!  She was good to me—­at least she was that!  And besides,” reflected Ethel, with the same caution and relief which she had so despised in New Yorkers, “she’s going soon.  It’s safe enough.”

The talk occurred the next morning, up in the new apartment.  There were no awkward preliminaries, for Mrs. Grewe’s whole manner had changed.  Quite a bit of its careful refinement was gone, and in its place was a rather bitter frankness.

“I quite understand—­you needn’t explain,” she said at once.  “Your husband has made a fuss, hasn’t he?  And this is good-bye.  Too bad, isn’t it?”

“Yes—­it is.”  Ethel hesitated, then all at once she beamed on her friend.  “I want you to know,” she stoutly declared, “that neither is my husband my boss nor am I a prig!  Back in school, we girls—­we used to talk—­and read and discuss things—­Bernard Shaw—­” Her hostess smiled: 

“Oh, Shaw, my dear, is a dear, witty man—­and he’s so funny and so fair.  But to live with him—­ugh!—­rather icy!” She laughed.  “See here.  No matter what you have read, you’ve never met me until now.  I mean the big Me that thrills all girls—­who speak about me in whispers.  Well, then, just for a minute, meet me—­look at me and see what I am.”  On her piquante little face was a look of friendly challenge.  “We’ve had such fine little shopping bees, and I’d like you not to be sorry.  And what I want to say is this: 

“I was just like you.  I came from a small town—­I had my dreams—­I reached New York—­I married.”  She smiled.  “Not once but twice.  I was divorced.  And my second was a love of a man, and we had such a blissful honeymoon.  It lasted a year and a half, and then—­he got taking things—­dope—­and that made it hard.  It ended in another divorce.  The next man didn’t marry me.  Meant to, you know, but hadn’t time.  Then he passed on—­” with a wave of her hand—­“and now I’m here.”  A humorous smile came over her face.  “And for the life of me I can’t see how changed it is from when I was married.  The same sort of apartment, only it’s nicer—­the same ocean liners and hotels—­the same cafes where one can dance exactly as one did before.”  Again she wrinkled up her brows.  “The only real difference I can see is that when I was married like you, my husband only told me the truth once in a while—­as yours did last night—­while now they tell it all the time.  Oh, I’m wise, I’m wise, my dear—­for one so young.  I’m twenty-eight.  How old are you?”