Helen laughed.
“My face is my fortune,” she said grimly. “Edith, I’ve made a lot of money!”
“Yes, dear--yes,” said Edith; and she spoke soothingly as you speak to a hurt child.
“I’ve made a lot of money,” repeated Helen of Troy. Then she looked away towards the window and the swaying pots of flowers alive in the sunshine. “And I’ve made nothing else,” she said with a little bitter laugh.
Edith did not speak, and the room seemed filled with an unanswerable silence. Helen of Troy got up at last and moved restlessly to and fro.
“I ought to be in the Park,” she said. “I’ve made heaps of engagements. It doesn’t matter. Why doesn’t your husband love you, Edith?”
“Oh, my dear--my dear!” murmured Edith, “don’t ask me that.”
“But that’s just what I’m going to ask you,” said Helen, coming to a stop in front of her friend. “Don’t pretend--with your eyes! Why, they were so sad when you came in, I thought--I thought--the pain in them would break everything in the room.”
“My husband,” said Edith quietly, “is the best man in the world.”
“As bad as that?” asked Helen, lifting her eyebrows. “Why, my dear, you might as well have married an institution or a reformatory outright.”