"But she told me that she had mentioned to you her engagement."
"Yes, she mentioned it."
"You speak as though she was one of the women who make and break engagements lightly. But she is not, I assure you: far from it."
"She broke this one, it seems."
"One breaking does not make a—breaker," said Sylvia, thinking vaguely of "swallows," and nearly saying "summer." She paused, then shook her head sadly. "I have never understood it," she said, with a deep sigh. "It lasted, I know, until the very end of June. I think I may say, without exaggeration, that I spent the entire month of July, day and night, picturing to myself his sufferings."
"You took more time than he did. He was married before July was ended."
"Simply despair."
"Despair took on a cheerful guise. Some of the rest of us might not object to it in such a shape."
But Miss Pitcher continued her dirge. "So terrible for such a man! A mere child—only seventeen!"
"And he is—"