y, I've counted the cost to me and Noreen and you. I'm
afraid this is what we are all up against."

"Well, what's the sum total?" Larry leaned back more comfortably; he
felt that Mary-Clare, once she began to talk, would say a good deal.
She would talk like one of her books. He need not pay much heed and
when she got out of breath he'd round her up. His interview with
Maclin had not been all business; the gossip, interjected, was taking
ugly and definite form now. Maclin had mentioned the man at the inn.
Quite incidentally, of course, but repeatedly.

"You see, Larry, I've got to tell you how it is, in my own way,"
Mary-Clare was speaking. "I know my way makes you angry, but please be
patient, for if I tried any other way it would hurt more."

"Fire away!" Larry nobly suppressed a yawn. Had Mary-Clare said
simply, "I don't love you any more," Larry would have got up from the
blow and been able to handle the matter, but she proceeded after a
fashion that utterly confused him and, instead of clearing the
situation, managed to create a most unlooked-for result.

"It's like this, Larry: I suppose life is a muddle for everyone and we
all do have to learn as we go on--nothing can keep us from that, not
even marriage, can it?"

No reply came to this.

"It's like light coming in spots, and then those spots can never be
really dark again although all the rest may be. You think of those
spots as bright and sure when all else is--is lost. That is the way it
has been with me."

"Gee!" Larry shrugged his shoulders.

"Larry, you _must_ try to understand!" Mary-Clare was growing
desperate.

"Then, try to talk American."

"I am, Larry. _My_ American. That's the trouble--there is more than
_one_ kind, you know. Larry, it was all wrong, my marrying you even
for dear Dad's sake. If he had been well and we could have talked it
over, he would have understood. I should have understood for him that
last night. Even the letters should not have mattered, they must not
matter now!"

This, at least, was comprehensible.

"Well, you _did_ marry me, didn't you?" Larry flung out. "You're my
wife, aren't you?" Correcting mistakes was not in Larry's plan of
life.

"I--why, yes, I am, Larry, but a wife means more than one thing,
doesn't it?" This came hopelessly.

"Not to me. What's your idea?" Larry was relieved at having the
conversation run along lines that he could handle with some degree of
common sense.

"Well, Larry, marriag