Ella called her into her bed-room as she passed the door, by humming the Wedding-march.

“Tum-tum-ti-tum!  Tum tum-ti-tum!” sang Ella, and Susan, uneasy but smiling, went to the doorway and looked in.

“Come in, Sue,” said Ella, pausing in the act of inserting a large bare arm into a sleeve almost large enough to accommodate Susan’s head.  “Where’ve you been all this time?  Mama thought that you were upstairs with Ken, but the nurse says that he’s been asleep for an hour.”

“Oh, that’s good!” said Susan, trying to speak naturally, but turning scarlet.  “The more he sleeps the better!”

“I want to tell you something, Susan,” said Ella, violently tugging at the hooks of her skirt,—­“Damn this thing!—­I want to tell you something, Susan.  You’re a very lucky girl; don’t you fool yourself about that!  Now it’s none of my affair, and I’m not butting in, but, at the same time, Ken’s health makes this whole matter a little unusual, and the fact that, as a family—­” Ella picked up a hand-mirror, and eyed the fit of her skirt in the glass—­“as a family,” she resumed, after a moment, “we all think it’s the wisest thing that Ken could do, or that you could do, makes this whole thing very different in the eyes of society from what it might be!  I don’t say it’s a usual marriage; I don’t say that we’d all feel as favorably toward it as we do if the circumstances were different,” Ella rambled on, snapping the clasp of a long jeweled chain, and pulling it about her neck to a becoming position.  “But I do say that it’s a very exceptional opportunity for a girl in your position, and one that any sensible girl would jump at.  I may be Ken’s sister,” finished Ella, rapidly assorting rings and slipping a selected few upon her fingers, “but I must say that!”

“I know,” said Susan, uncomfortably.  Ella, surprised perhaps at the listless tone, gave her a quick glance.

“Mama,” said Miss Saunders, with a little color, “Mama is the very mildest of women, but as Mama said, ’I don’t see what more any girl could wish!’ Ken has got the easiest disposition in the world, if he’s let alone, and, as Hudson said, there’s nothing really the matter with him, he may live for twenty or thirty years, probably will!”

“Yes, I know,” Susan said quickly, wishing that some full and intelligent answer would suggest itself to her.

“And finally,” Ella said, quite ready to go downstairs for an informal game of cards, but not quite willing to leave the matter here.  “Finally, I must say, Sue, that I think this shilly-shallying is very—­very unbecoming.  I’m not asking to be in your confidence, I don’t care one way or the other, but Mama and the Kid have always been awfully kind to you—­”

“You’ve all been angels,” Susan was glad to say eagerly.

“Awfully kind of you,” Ella pursued, “and all I say is this, make up your mind!  It’s unexpected, and it’s sudden, and all that,—­very well!  But you’re of age, and you’ve nobody to please but yourself, and, as I say—­as I say—­while it’s nothing to me, I like you and I hate to have you make a fool of yourself!”