"Oh, a girl abroad never would dare to do such a thing," May put in naïvely.
"But you thought that in America a girl might do what she pleases. Why, do you mean to tell me that you didn't understand perfectly well that you had no business to write to a man that you don't know? I don't believe any such nonsense."
May blushed very much, and hung her head.
"But I wanted so much to know him," she murmured almost inaudibly.
Mrs. Harbinger regarded her a moment with the expression of a mother who has reached that stage of exasperation which is next halting-place before castigation. Then she turned and walked vehemently up the drawing-room and back, a quick sprint which seemed to have very little effect in cooling her indignation.
"How long has this nonsense been going on?" she demanded, with a new sternness in her voice.
"For—for six weeks," answered May tearfully. Then she lifted her swimming eyes in pitiful appeal, and proffered a plea for mercy. "Of course I didn't use my own name."
"Five or six weeks!" cried Mrs. Harbinger, throwing up her hands.
"But at first we didn't write more than once or twice a week."
The other stared as if May were exploding a succession of torpedoes under her very nose.