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“It’s not,” she went on presently, “as if I were a woman who takes marriage lightly. I have tried. But I won’t desert Mamma. And I won’t–I will NOT!–endure having George talk to me as he did today!”

She would go down to the children, she would rest, she would read again during the quiet evenings. Days would go by, weeks. But finally George would write her–would come to her. He must. What else could he do?

Something like terror shook her. Was this the way serious, endless separations began between men and their wives? Her mind flitted sickly to other people’s troubles: the Waynes, who had separated because Rose liked gayety and Fred liked domestic peace; the Gardiners, who–well, there never did seem to be any reason there. Frances and the baby just went to her mother’s home, and stayed home, and after a while people said she and Sid had separated, though Frances said she would always like Sid as a friend–not very serious reasons, these! Yet they had proved enough.

Mary paused. Was she playing with fire? Ah, no, she told herself, it was very different in her case. This was no imaginary case of “neglect” or “incompatibility.” There was the living trouble,–Mamma. And even if tonight she conceded this point to George, and Mamma was banished, sooner or later resentment, bitter and uncontrollable, would rise again, she knew, in her heart. No. She would go. George might do the yielding.

Once or twice tears threatened her calm. But it was only necessary to remind herself of what George had said to dry her eyes into angry brilliance again. Too late now for tears.

At five o’clock the trunk was packed, but Mamma had not yet arrived. There remained merely to wait for her, and to start with her for Beach Meadow. Mary’s heart was beating fast now, but it was less with regret than with a nervous fear that something would delay her now. She turned the key in the trunk lock and straightened up with the sudden realization that her back was aching.

For a moment she stood, undecided, in the centre of her room. Should she leave a little note for George, “on his pincushion,” or simply ask Lizzie to say that she had gone to Beach Meadow? He would not follow her there, she knew; George understood her. He knew of how little use bullying or coaxing would be. There would be no scenes. She would be allowed to settle down to an existence that would be happy for Mamma, good for the children, restful–free from distressing strain–for Mary herself.

With a curious freedom from emotion of any sort, she selected a hat, and laid her gloves beside it on the bed. Just then the front door, below her, opened to admit the noise of hurried feet and of joyous laughter. Several voices were talking at once. Mary, to whom the group was still invisible, recognized one of these as belonging to Mamma. As she went downstairs, she had only time for one apprehensive thrill, before Mamma herself ran about the curve of the stairway, and flung herself into Mary’s arms.

Mamma was dressed in corn-colored silk, over which an exquisite wrap of the same shade fell in rich folds. Her hat was a creation of pale yellow plumes and hydrangeas, her silk stockings and little boots corn-colored. She dragged the bewildered Mary down the stairway, and Mary, pausing at the landing, looked dazedly at her husband, who stood in the hall below with a dark, middle-aged man whom she had never seen before.

“Here she is!” Mamma cried joyously. “Richie, come kiss her right this minute! Ma’y, darling, this is your new papa!”

“WHAT!” said Mary, faintly. But before she knew it the strange man did indeed kiss her, and then George kissed her, and Mamma kissed her again, and all three shouted with laughter as they went over and over the story. Mary, in all the surprise and confusion, still found time to marvel at the sight of George’s radiant face.