"Why not, Bessy? She says she's married, and she wears a wedding-ring; and her clothes is beautiful."
"I'd like to see her marriage lines," said Mrs. Bundlecombe. "But, there! maybe I'm hard on her, poor thing, which I ought not to be, seeing that I know what trouble is, and how strangely marriages do turn out sometimes. But if there is a husband in the case, it's shameful the way he neglects her, never coming to see her, and going abroad on business, as she says, while she stays with her grandmother!"
"She pays Mrs. Harrington," remarked Mrs. Chigwin, reflectively, "and she always seems to have plenty of money; but she do look sad and mournful now and then, and money's not everything to those that want a little love."
As she concluded her moral observation, she started up, for a shadow darkened the open doorway: and on looking up, she saw that Milly herself was standing just outside. The girl's beautiful face was pale and agitated; and there were tears in her eyes. The old woman noticed that she was growing haggard, and that there were black lines beneath her eyes; they exchanged significant looks, and then asked her to step in and sit down.
"You run about too much and fatigue yourself," said Mrs. Chigwin. "Now you sit there and look at my flowers, how still they keep; they wouldn't be half so fine if I was always transplanting them. You want a good, quiet home for yourself: not to be moving about and staying with friends, however fond of you they may be."
Milly had sunk into the chair offered to her, with a look of extreme exhaustion and fatigue, but at Mrs. Chigwin's words she sat up, and her eyes began to grow bright again.
"I think so myself, Mrs. Chigwin. I shall be glad to get back to my own nice quiet home again. As for looking tired, it is only because I have been packing up my things and getting ready to go. Mr. Beadon has written to me to join him in London, and I am going to start this very afternoon."
The rosy color came back into her face: she smiled triumphantly, but her lips quivered as she smiled.
"That's right, my dear. I don't approve of young husbands and wives living separate, unless there's some very good cause for it," said Mrs. Bundlecombe, thinking of her beloved Alan. "It always gives occasion to the enemy, and I think you're very wise to go back. Perhaps you had some little bit of a tiff or misunderstanding with Mr. Beadon——"
"Oh no," said Milly. The color in her face was painfully hot now. "Mr. Beadon is always very good and kind. But," she continued, looking down and pushing her wedding-ring to and fro, "he is very busy indeed, and he is obliged to go abroad sometimes on business. He travels—I think he calls it—for a great London house. He is getting on very well, he says, in his own particular line."