"I'm from Indianapolis. I want a quiet place for the next few months.
Two, to be exact."
Sweeping her with a look. "Are you in any kind of difficulty?"
"No—not that! I've left my husband. We agreed to separate. I want a few weeks of quiet until—afterward, and then I can arrange to start out on my own."
"You're too nice a girl to—"
"I'm not asking anything. I am not the kind you are evidently accustomed to deal with here. It is simply that I'm strange."
"Have you no friends?"
"None with whom I desire to communicate."
"Well," doubtfully, "there is the Nonsectarian Home for Indigent Girls and the Hanna Larchmont Lying-in Hospital—"
"Oh," cried Lilly, with a sting of color to her cheeks, "you don't understand! I have funds. I tell you it is just that I am strange. I want a medium-priced place to live for the next few weeks, where it won't be embarrassing."
The matron unlocked a drawer.