The car was stopping before the hotel. Now the doorman opened the door and Bonbright helped his bride to alight. She tottered as her feet touched the sidewalk, and he took her arm to support her as he might have helped an invalid. The elevator carried them up to the floor on which were the rooms that had been prepared for them, and they stopped before the door while he inserted the key and turned the lock for their admission. On the threshold she halted, swept by a wave of terror, but, clenching her hands and pressing shut her eyes, she stepped within. The door closed behind them—closed out her girlhood, closed out her independence, shut away from her forever that ownership of herself which had been so precious, yet so unrecognized and unconsidered. It seemed to her that the closing of that door—even more than the ceremony of marriage—was symbolical of turning over to this young man the title deeds of her soul and body. …
Bonbright was helping her to rid herself of her wraps, leading her to a sofa.
"Lie down," he said, gently. "You're tired and bothered. Just lie down and rest."
"Are we going away?" she asked, presently. "Have I got to get ready?"
He had promised her they would go away—and had not seen her since that moment to tell her what had happened. Hilda would not let him go to her that morning, so she was in ignorance of the change in his condition, of his break with his family, and of the fact that he was nothing but a boy with a job, dependent upon his wages. Until this moment he had not thought how it might affect her; of her disappointment, of the fact that she might have expected and looked forward to the position he could give her as the wife of the heir apparent to the Foote dynasty…. It embarrassed him, shamed him as a boy might be shamed who was unable to buy for his girl a trinket she coveted at some country fair. Now she must be told, and she was in no condition to bear disappointments.
"I promised you we should go away," he said, haltingly, "but—but I can't manage it. Things have happened….I've got to be at work in the morning. Maybe I should have told you. Maybe I should have come last night after it happened—"
She opened her eyes, and at the expression of his face she sat up, alarmed. It told her that no ordinary, small, casual mishap had befallen, but something vital, something which might affect him—and her tremendously.
"What is it?" she asked. "What has happened?"
"I went home last night," he said, slowly. "After—you promised to marry me—I went home to tell father….Mother was there. There was a row—but mother was worse than father. She was—rather bad."
"Rather bad—how, Bonbright?"