Page:Glimpses of the Moon (Wharton 1922).djvu/51

Rh I'm not to be always about, because you're just married; but could you see to it that I have my meals regularly?"

"Why, you poor darling! Don't you always?"

"Not when mother's away on these cures. The servants don't always obey me: you see I'm so little for my age. In a few years, of course, they'll have to—even if I don't grow much," she added judiciously. She put out her hand and touched the string of pearls about Susy's throat. "They're small, but they're very good. I suppose you don't take the others when you travel?"

"The others? Bless you! I haven't any others—and never shall have, probably."

"No other pearls?"

"No other jewels at all."

Clarissa stared. "Is that really true?" she asked, as if in the presence of the unprecedented.

"Awfully true," Susy confessed. "But I think I can make the servants obey me all the same."

This point seemed to have lost its interest for Clarissa, who was still gravely scrutinizing her companion. After a while she brought forth another question.

"Did you have to give up all your jewels when you were divorced?"

"Divorced—?" Susy threw her head back against the pillows and laughed. "Why, what are you thinking of? Don't you remember that I wasn't even married the last time you saw me?"

"Yes; I do. But that was two years ago." The