She dropped the sheet and pirouetted round the room in and out between the chairs occupied by her frightened parents—they thought her suddenly gone mad from the shock. “Who says I ain’t the luckiest girl on earth?” she exclaimed.
“What are you talking about, Jenny?” demanded her mother sharply.
“Why, I married Tom Burster half an hour ago. He’s putting the notices in all the papers for to-morrow morning. Everybody’ll think I changed my mind and shook Frothingham. And I did, too!”
“Jenny!” exclaimed her father. “Tom Burster!”
“And he’s coming here to dinner, if you don’t object,” she continued. “If you do, why I’ll join him and we’ll go away and give you a chance to cool off.” She caught her father by the beard. “What do you say, daddy? Say yes, or I’ll pull.”
“Yes,” replied her father with a huge sigh of relief—his daughter was contented; her and their vanity would be spared; Tom Burster would not demand or want a dower; he was not only independent, but also one of the most forward young “self-made” rich men in Chicago. “You’ve got more sense than all the rest of the family put together,” he exclaimed proudly, patting her on the head.
And in an absent, reflective tone she said: “I always felt I’d have some use for Tom sooner or later.”