alone together Miss Summers began
abruptly to talk. She hummed a little at first, and then broke into a
long speech which had been seething all day in her mind.

"I hope you don't think I was nasty to Nancy this morning, Sally. She's
a funny girl. She's in love, you know; and thinks of nothing but this
man. And he's a married man, too, and not a good man, Sally. He'd think
nothing of leading a girl like Nancy into doing wrong, and leaving her
to get on as well as she can. Well, that's not right, Sally." Miss
Summers felt for her handkerchief, and Sally noticed with astonishment
that there were tears in her eyes. "You see, when a man's married he
ought to be careful what he does. Now once, when I was a girl, I'd got
my head full of the sort of things that young girls have--not you,
Sally; you're too sensible;--and I met a man, and thought he was the ...
well, I thought he was the finest man in the world. He wasn't. He'd got
a poor wretched wife that he neglected, and he drank, and when he ran
away they found he'd been betting with money that didn't belong to him.
And he very nearly took me with him. Fortunately, I didn't go. I was
afraid to go--though I didn't know about his wife. He said he'd marry me
when we got away. Well, I thought it was funny. I said, 'Why not
before?' and he said, 'You don't understand. What if we didn't suit each
other?' I said, 'Why shouldn't we? Other people get married.' And all
that sort of thing I said. Well, I wanted to go, and wanted to go; and
at last I didn't, and I was thankful afterwards. Now Nancy's man is a
shopwalker somewhere. He's got no money, but he's good-looking, you
know, and girls think a lot of that when they're young; and also he's
one of those men who give a girl the idea that he can have twenty others
if he wants them. That's what upsets a girl. She thinks she's got to
make her mind up in a hurry, or lose him, d'you see?"

"More fool she," remarked Sally. "Pooh!"

"So _I_ say. Mind, in Nancy's case, she's just in love. He may not want
her. She doesn't know. And it's the uncertainty that keeps her like
this. Far better if she married some steady young fellow who'd make her
a good husband. But girls don't think of that. They don't like steady
fellows, any more than young fellows like steady girls."

"That's true," said Sally, thoughtfully. "They want a bit of ginger."

"Well, sometimes I think nobody ought to marry until they're well on in
life."

"They'd miss a lot