To-day she was a married woman who, a moment ago, had been standing
before a minister, binding herself for good or ill to a man who was
delightfully a boy and of whom she knew next to nothing. What did it
matter--what did anything matter--so long as she achieved her long-
dreamed-of ambition to live and see life?

"Then I can go ahead," she added, "and dress as becomes the wife of
a man of one of our best families. I've never been able to dress
before. Trust me to make an excellent beginning." There was a
twinkle of humor in her eyes as she said these things, and
excitement too. "Tell me this, Marty: is it as easy to get unmarried
as it is to get married?"

"You're not thinking about that already, surely!"

"Oh, no. But information is always useful, isn't it?"

Just for a moment the boy's heart went down into his boots. She
didn't love him yet; he knew that He intended to earn her love as an
honest man earns his living. What hurt was the note of flippancy in
her voice in talking of an event that was to him so momentous and
wonderful. It seemed to mean no more to her to have entered into a
lifelong tie than the buying of a mere hat--not so much, not nearly
so much, as to have found a way of not going back to those two old
people in the country. She was young, awfully young, he told himself
again. Presently her feet would touch the earth, and she would
understand.

As they walked up Fifth Avenue and with little gurgles of enthusiasm
Joan halted at every other shop to look at hats that appealed to