She made infinitesimal lists, and put them into her shopping bag, or stuck them in her mirror, but Wolf laughed at them all. And instead of disposing of them, they developed a demoralizing habit of wandering out into Broadway, in their old fashion, after dinner, looking into shop windows, drifting into little theatres, talking to beggars and taxi-cab men and policemen and strangers generally, mingling with the bubbling young life of the city that overflowed the sidewalks, and surged in and out of candy and drug stores, and sat talking on park benches deep into the soft young summer nights.
Sometimes they went down to the shrill and crowded streets of the lower east side, and philosophized youthfully over what they saw there; and, as the nights grew heavier and warmer, they often took the car, and skimmed out into the heavenly green open spaces of the park, or, on Saturday afternoon, packed their supper, and carried it fifty miles away to the woods or the shore.
CHAPTER XXV
Before she had been married ten days Norma dutifully went to call upon old Mrs. Melrose, being fortunate enough to find Leslie there. The old lady came toward Norma with her soft old wavering footsteps, and gave the girl a warm kiss even with her initial rebuke:
"Well, I don't know whether I am speaking to this bad runaway or not!" she quavered, releasing Norma from her bejewelled and lace-draped embrace, and shaking her fluffed and scanty gray hair.
"Oh, yes, you are, Aunt Marianna," the girl said, confidently, with her happy laugh. Leslie, coming more slowly forward, laughed and kissed her, too.
"But why didn't you tell us, Norma, and have a regular wedding, like mine?" she protested. "I didn't know that you and your cousin were even engaged!"
"We've worked it out that we were engaged for exactly three hours and ten minutes," Norma said, as they all settled down in the magnificent, ugly, comfortable old sitting-room for tea. She could see that both Leslie and her grandmother were far from displeased. As a matter of fact, the old lady was secretly delighted. The girl was most suitably and happily and satisfactorily married; justice had been done her, and she had solved her own problem splendidly.