"Then, what did you say?—what did you mean?"
"Nothing, except that it was a great folly—but a very pleasant one—when we got married in that private way. It would have been better to have waited."
"But it was you that urged me."
"To the marriage, but not the secrecy, that was your own doings entirely, Kate. I wanted you to go at once and live with the old folks, while I went this voyage, but you begged and pleaded to stay with your mother, and what could I do but consent. Of course, as my wife, you must have lived with my family, so you preferred secrecy and your mother. It was a foolish arrangement altogether."
"My poor mother was so sad and lonely then, I could not bear to leave her; besides, I did not dare tell her about it while she was in poor health—she would have taken on dreadfully—for somehow——"
"Yes, I know she hated me."
"No, not that; but mother has strange prejudices."
"I should think she had. I have not forgotten her forbidding me the house; but for that——"
"What were you saying, Nelson? your voice is very husky."
"I was saying that we should not have been led into the weakness of this concealment if she had been more reasonable."