"Well, he'll have to leave his mother, that's all!" said Susan.
"Oh, my dear, that's just what they quarreled about! He WON'T."
"He--WON'T?"
"No, if you please! And you can imagine how furious that made Georgie! And when Ma told us that, she simply set her lips,--you know Ma! And then she said that she was going to see Father Birch with Georgie this afternoon, to have it annulled at once."
"Without saying a word to Joe!"
"Oh, they went first to Joe's. Oh, no, Joe is perfectly willing. It was, as Ma says, a mistake from beginning to end."
"But how can it be annulled, Mary Lou?" Susan asked.
"Well, I don't understand exactly," Mary Lou answered coloring. "I think it's because they didn't go on any honeymoon--they didn't set up housekeeping, you know, or something like that!"
"Oh," said Susan, hastily, coloring too. "But wouldn't you know that if any one of us did get married, it would be annulled!" she said disgustedly. The others both began to laugh.
Still, it was all very exciting. When Georgie and her mother got home at dinner-time, the bride was pale and red-eyed, excited, breathing hard. She barely touched her dinner. Susan could not keep her eyes from the familiar hand, with its unfamiliar ring.