rosary, but she had been so bitterly reared as a Protestant that she
could not bring herself to use it.

Yet none of her intimates in the school and in the boarding-house knew
of her abyss of passion. They said she was "so optimistic."

When she heard that Kennicott was to marry a girl, pretty, young, and
imposingly from the Cities, Vida despaired. She congratulated Kennicott;
carelessly ascertained from him the hour of marriage. At that hour,
sitting in her room, Vida pictured the wedding in St. Paul. Full of an
ecstasy which horrified her, she followed Kennicott and the girl who had
stolen her place, followed them to the train, through the evening, the
night.

She was relieved when she had worked out a belief that she wasn't really
shameful, that there was a mystical relation between herself and Carol,
so that she was vicariously yet veritably with Kennicott, and had the
right to be.

She saw Carol during the first five minutes in Gopher Prairie. She
stared at the passing motor, at Kennicott and the girl beside him. In
that fog world of transference of emotion Vida had no normal jealousy
but a conviction that, since through Carol she had received Kennicott's
love, then Carol was a part of her, an astral self, a heightened and
more beloved self. She was glad of the girl's charm, of the smooth black
hair, the airy head and young shoulders. But she was suddenly angry.
Carol glanced at her for a quarter-second, but looked past her, at an
old roadside barn. If she had made the great sacrifice, at least she
expected gratitude and recognition, Vida raged, while her conscious
schoolroom mind fussily begged her to control this insanity.