“It was a time of horror,” Harriet said, smiling a little, after a moment of thought.  “The strange women and the strange room, and Royal coming in with flowers, and sitting beside me.  The doctor said it was a touch of poisoning, and I was ill only a few days.  But the home-sickness, and the strangeness!  Somehow, I didn’t feel married, I felt like a lost little girl.  I wanted to be back in Linda’s kitchen again, safe, and scolding because nothing interesting ever happened.

“Well, I was sick for three or four days.  It was the fourth day when I was well enough to go out.  Royal thanked them, and paid Mrs. Harrington and the doctor and we went to lunch downtown—­it was at Martin’s, I remember, and Royal was so excited and interested in everything.  But I still felt limp and dull.  We shopped and went about seeing things after lunch, and then we went to the hotel where he was staying.  We were registered there as Mr. and Mrs. Blondin; it was all quite taken for granted.”

Harriet stopped; her face was drawn and white, her words coming with difficulty, the phrases brief and dry.  Richard was paying her absolute attention, his eyes fixed upon her face.

“We had dinner upstairs,” she said.  She paused, her lips tight pressed.

“I can’t tell you,” she began again, suddenly, “I can’t tell you how it was that I came suddenly to know that I was too young for marriage!  In Miriam Street’s little studio, where they were laughing about the baby and the supper, it had seemed different.  But here, in a hotel, I suddenly wanted my sister, I wanted to be home again.

“We were talking and planning naturally enough.  Royal was coming and going in the two rooms; I had plenty of chance to—­to escape.  Every time I let one go by my heart beat harder.”

He could tell from her voice that her heart was beating hard now with the memory of that old time.

“If I had let them all go by,” she recommenced, “my life would have been different.  In a few weeks we would have come back to Watertown, as man and wife, and perhaps had a studio near the Streets’, and perhaps found a solution.  But I couldn’t!

“I caught up my coat; left my hat and bag.  I went down the stairs, not daring to wait for the elevator.  And I went to Mrs. Harrington’s.  She was very kind and took me in; she said that perhaps it would be better to wait—­until I was older.  I cried all night, and the next day Mrs. Harrington lent me the money and I went back to Linda.

“Of course, it was terrible, at first.  But they were kind to me, in their way.  And I was—­cured.  I went into hysterics at the first mention of the whole hideous thing.  They saw Roy, and they told me that I need never see him again.  The papers—­for it got to the papers!—­said that a divorce had been arranged, but there was no need for a divorce.  It was all hushed up—­Linda and Fred never spoke of it.  I—­ah, well, I couldn’t!