Marriage à la mode | Page 9

that----"
"That I knew anything about Mrs. Verrier's affairs?" said Miss Floyd,
with a rather uncomfortable laugh. "Well, you see, American girls are

not like English ones. We don't pretend not to know what everybody
knows."
"Of course," said Roger hurriedly; "but you wouldn't think it a fair and
square thing to do?"
"Think what?"
"Why, to marry a man, and then talk of divorcing him because people
didn't invite you to their parties."
"She was very unhappy," said Daphne stubbornly.
"Well, by Jove!" cried the young man, "she doesn't look very happy
now!"
"No," Miss Floyd admitted. "No. There are many people who think
she'll never get over it."
"Well, I give it up." The Apollo shrugged his handsome shoulders.
"You say it was she who proposed to divorce him?--yet when the
wretched man removes himself, then she breaks her heart!"
"Naturally she didn't mean him to do it in that way," said the girl, with
impatience. "Of course you misunderstood me entirely!--entirely!" she
added with an emphasis which suited with her heightened colour and
evidently ruffled feelings.
Young Barnes looked at her with embarrassment. What a queer,
hot-tempered girl! Yet there was something in her which attracted him.
She was graceful even in her impatience. Her slender neck, and the
dark head upon it, her little figure in the white muslin, her dainty arms
and hands--these points in her delighted an honest eye, quite
accustomed to appraise the charms of women. But, by George! she took
herself seriously, this little music-teacher. The air of wilful command
about her, the sharpness with which she had just rebuked him, amazed
and challenged him.

"I am very sorry if I misunderstood you," he said, a little on his dignity;
"but I thought you----"
"You thought I sympathized with Mrs. Verrier? So I do; though of
course I am awfully sorry that such a dreadful thing happened. But
you'll find, Mr. Barnes, that American girls----" The colour rushed into
her small olive cheeks. "Well, we know all about the old ideas, and we
know also too well that there's only one life, and we don't mean to have
that one spoilt. The old notions of marriage--your English notions,"
cried the girl facing him--"make it tyranny! Why should people stay
together when they see it's a mistake? We say everybody shall have
their chance. And not one chance only, but more than one. People find
out in marriage what they couldn't find out before, and so----"
"You let them chuck it just when they're tired of it?" laughed Barnes.
"And what about the----"
"The children?" said Miss Floyd calmly. "Well, of course, that has to
be very carefully considered. But how can it do children any good to
live in an unhappy home?"
"Had Mrs. Verrier any children?"
"Yes, one little girl."
"I suppose she meant to keep her?"
"Why, of course."
"And the father didn't care?"
"Well, I believe he did," said Daphne unwillingly. "Yes, that was very
sad. He was quite devoted to her."
"And you think that's all right?" Barnes looked at his companion,
smiling.
"Well, of course, it was a pity," she said, with fresh impatience; "I
admit it was a pity. But then, why did she ever marry him? That was

the horrible mistake."
"I suppose she thought she liked him."
"Oh, it was he who was so desperately in love with her. He plagued her
into doing it."
"Poor devil!" said Barnes heartily. "All right, we're coming."
The last words were addressed to General Hobson, waving to them
from the kitchen-garden. They hurried on to join the curator, who took
the party for a stroll round some of the fields over which George
Washington, in his early married life, was accustomed to ride in
summer and winter dawns, inspecting his negroes, his plantation, and
his barns. The grass in these Southern fields was already high; there
were shining fruit-trees, blossom-laden, in an orchard copse; and the
white dogwood glittered in the woods.
For two people to whom the traditions of the place were dear, this quiet
walk through Washington's land had a charm far beyond that of the
reconstructed interior of the house. Here were things unaltered and
unalterable, boundaries, tracks, woods, haunted still by the figure of the
young master and bridegroom who brought Patsy Curtis there in 1759.
To the gray-haired curator every foot of them was sacred and familiar;
he knew these fields and the records of them better than any detail of
his own personal affairs; for years now he had lived in spirit with
Washington, through all the hours of the Mount Vernon day; his life
was ruled by one great ghost, so that everything actual was
comparatively dim. Boyson too, a fine soldier and a fine intelligence,
had a mind stored with Washingtoniana. Every