"You see," she said, "I didn't really care very much for George. I thought I did at first, but I didn't. Papa really made me marry him. And you know he is untrue to me."
Merriam could have gasped. He felt himself falling through the thin ice of mere "conversation," on which he had tried so hard to skate, into the depths of real talk. But it was good to be in the depths. And after his first breathlessness he was filled with love and pity. How much the brief, girlish sentences portrayed of disillusionment and tragedy!
"You know about that then?" he asked gently.
"Of course," said Mollie June, almost scornfully. "Before company Aunt Mary and Alicia and Mr. Rockwell keep up the pretence that I can know nothing about such things. I keep it up too! But Aunt Mary knows all about them. George never can conceal anything from her. And I make her tell me everything. Everything!"
Merriam, I suspect, hardly sensed the amount of intellect and character which Mollie June's last statement betrayed--I use the word advisedly, for, of course, intellect and character detract from a young girl's charm, and if she desires to be pretty and alluring she should, and usually does, carefully conceal whatever of such attributes she may be handicapped with. But to "make" Aunt Mary disclose things she wished not to disclose was no small achievement.
"You know about this Jennie Higgins?" Merriam asked.
"Yes. I've seen her and talked with her."
"How?" was Merriam's startled question.
"She's a manicurist, you know. She's employed at ----" Mollie June mentioned a well-known establishment on Michigan Avenue, the name of which for obvious reasons I suppress. "When I found that out, I went there to have my nails done. I just asked for--Madame Couteau, and waited till she was free. She didn't know me, of course. She's pretty," said Mollie June, with judicial coldness.
After a moment she added, "And sweet and--warm."