“We’re back in New York, Teddy!  We’re home again!” She was gathering her things together.  A thought smote her, and she paused with suddenly colouring cheeks.  This might so easily have been her wedding-trip; she and Clifford might have been together now.

Poor Clifford, with his stiffly moving brain and his platitudes!  She hoped he would marry some more grateful woman some day.  What a Paradise opening for Lydia if he could ever fancy her again!  Martie spent a moment in wonder as to what the story given Monroe would be.  She had mailed a letter to Lydia, and one to Clifford, during that last, quiet, foggy morning—­letters written after the packing had been done on that last night.  She had suggested that Monroe be given a hint that business had taken Mrs. Bannister suddenly eastward.  It would be a nine days’ wonder; in six months Monroe would only vaguely remember it.  Gossips might suspect the truth:  they would never know it.  Clifford himself, in another year, would be placidly implying that there never had been anything in the rumour of an engagement.  Rose would dimple and shake her head; Martie was always just a little odd.  Lydia would confide to Sally that she was just sick for fear that Dryden man—­and Sally, sternly inspecting Jimmy’s little back for signs of measles, would quote Joe.  Joe always thought Martie would make good, and Joe wasn’t one bit sorry she had done as she had.  Dr. Ben would defend her, too, for on that sudden impulsive call she had let her full heart thank him for all his fatherly goodness to her beloved Sally, and had told him what she was doing.

“Mark ye, if you was engaged to me, ye wouldn’t jump the traces like this!” the old man had assured her.

“Dr. Ben, I wouldn’t want to!” she had answered gaily.  “You’re older than Cliff; I know that.  But you’re broad, Dr. Ben, and you’re simple, and you aren’t narrow!  You’ve grown older the way I want to, just smiling and listening.  And you know more in your little finger than—­than some people know in their whole bodies!” And she put her arms about his neck, and gave him a daughter’s laughing kiss.

“Looky here,” said the old man, warming, “a man’s got to be dead before he can stand for a thing like this!  You haven’t got a waiting-list, I suppose, Miss Martie?”

“No, sir!” she answered positively.  “But if ever I do I’ll let you know!”

She and Teddy ate their first meal at Childs’.  Little signs bearing the single word “strawberries” were pasted on the window; Martie felt a real thrill of affection for the place as she went in.  After a while “Old Southern Corn Cakes” would take the place of the strawberries, and then grape-fruit “In Season Now.”

“After a while we’ll be too rich to come here, Ted!” she said as they went out.

“Wull we?” Teddy asked regretfully.  They went into the pushing and crowding of the streets; heard the shrill trill of the crossing policeman’s whistle again; caught a glimpse of Broadway’s lights, fanning lower and higher, and as the big signs rippled up and down.