She shook her head.
"I follow you," she reminded him, quite simply and gravely. "Where would—it be easiest for you? You spoke of going out of town; perhaps that would be best. I think, it seems to me, that we should start as we mean to go on."
"Yes!" he exclaimed eagerly. She had offered him his inmost desire; in his gratitude he caught her hand, stammering in the rush of words released. "Yes. If you will go, I have a house—our house. Let me tell you. Yesterday, after meeting you at Masterson's the night before, I was at the limit. I had to keep out of doors and keep moving, or go to pieces. I kept seeing Fred, and Holly. Well, I took a long drive; across the river, I went, perhaps because you were always looking over there as if it were some kind of a fairyland. And on the way back, on the road along the Palisades, I saw the house. It was—I stopped and went in. It looked like a place you had made a picture of. I can't explain what I mean, but I sat down there and thought things out. You won't be angry? I bought it. Not that I was so sure of you! You see, if you refused to take me, I knew I had money enough to buy fifty like it for a whim. And if you would come, it was the house."
There was no anger in her glance, only a heartening comprehension and cordial willingness.
"Let us go there," she agreed. "I should like that best of all."
Reanimated, he put her into the waiting taxicab, gave the chauffeur his directions, and closed the door upon their first wedded solitude.
"But this is one of the things we must not do," she told him, bringing the relief of humor to the situation. "We must not take taxis and let them wait for us with a price on the head of each moment. It is more than extravagant; it is reckless."
He laughed out, surprised.
"So it is. I am afraid you will have a lot to teach me."
"Yes," she assumed the burden. "Yes."