My
life is for the world.
Oh, I've been a child, caring only for the lights and the pretty things
and the music; but I'm not blind now. I understand many things that were
hidden from the plain girl from the West. I have lived a year in every
day. I see as they are these people I have thought so kind. So rich I call
them now; so smug, so socially jealous.
There's Meg Van Dam, now; surely she knows why I have come to her, and she
was Milly's friend; yet she fawns upon me. I thought her a great person,
but now I know she's eager to rise by hanging at my skirts, and I amuse
myself with her joy that I've rejected Ned, as she thinks; with her talk
of Strathay, her dismay at John Burke's wooing.
John's so persistent. He called to see me the very day--almost in the hour
I came here; the hour I was pacing the dainty little room Meg assigns me,
picturing the scene on board the Bermuda boat, wondering if Ned had gone
to the dock on the chance of a parting word with Milly, torturing myself
with the vision of a lovers' reconciliation.
When John's card was brought, I was tempted to refuse to see him. But at
the thought that he would know too well how to interpret reserves, I went
down, nerved to meet him with a smile.
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