In Greenwich Village they procured a license, and a magistrate married them, and they were a little frightened and greatly happy and, they both discovered simultaneously, outrageously hungry. So they drove through Bedford Village to South Salem, and lunched at the Horse and Hounds Inn, on blue and white china, in the same room where Major Andre was once a prisoner. And they felt very sorry for Major Andre, and for everybody who had not been just married that morning. And after lunch they sat outside in the garden and fed lumps of sugar to a charming collie and cream to a fat gray cat.
They decided to start housekeeping in Carter’s flat, and so turned back to New York, this time following the old coach road through North Castle to White Plains, across to Tarrytown, and along the bank of the Hudson into Riverside Drive. Millions and millions of friendly folk, chiefly nurse-maids and traffic policemen, waved to them, and for some reason smiled.
“The joke of it is,” declared Carter, “they don’t know! The most wonderful event of the century has just passed into history. We are married, and nobody knows!”
But when the car drove away from in front of Carter’s door, they saw on top of it two old shoes and a sign reading: “We have just been married.” While they had been at luncheon, the chauffeur had risen to the occasion.
“After all,” said Carter soothingly, “he meant no harm. And it’s the only thing about our wedding yet that seems legal.”
Three months later two very unhappy young people faced starvation in the sitting-room of Carter’s flat. Gloom was written upon the countenance of each, and the heat and the care that comes when one desires to live, and lacks the wherewithal to fulfill that desire, had made them pallid and had drawn black lines under Dolly’s eyes.
Mrs. Ingram had played her part exactly as her dearest friends had said she would. She had sent to Carter’s flat, seven trunks filled with Dolly’s clothes, eighteen hats, and another most unpleasant letter. In this, on the sole condition that Dolly would at once leave her husband, she offered to forgive and to support her.
To this Dolly composed eleven scornful answers, but finally decided that no answer at all was the most scornful.
She and Carter then proceeded joyfully to waste his three thousand dollars with that contempt for money with which on a honey-moon it should always be regarded. When there was no more, Dolly called upon her mother’s lawyers and inquired if her father had left her anything in her own right. The lawyers regretted he had not, but having loved Dolly since she was born, offered to advance her any money she wanted. They said they felt sure her mother would “relent.”
“SHE may,” said Dolly haughtily. “I WON’T! And my husband can give me all I need. I only wanted something of my own, because I’m going to make him a surprise present of a new motor-car. The one we are using now does not suit us.”