Page:Lost Ecstasy (1927).pdf/167

 begin and she could forget. Boxes would arrive, people would be coming and going. There were notes to write and clothes to be fitted.

Even Bessie was deceived for a time. Then one morning when Kay had been out late the night before, she arrived before she had wakened. She fidgeted about for a while and then walked into Kay's room. She was still asleep, but her pillow was wet with tears.

Bessie stood looking down at her, her long cigarette holder in her hand, and Kay stirred and roused. She felt the damp pillow and tried to turn it, but it was too late.

"Kay darling," Bessie said, "maybe I ought to keep my mouth shut, but—do you think you'd better go through with this?"

"I'm all right in the daytime, Aunt Bessie. It's only at night"

"At night! Good heavens, Kay, you'll have to sleep with the man you marry! If you're going to cry about somebody else in your sleep it isn't fair to Herbert. It's—it's not decent."

"But I don't know who or what it's about. Honestly. I never remember."

Bessie sniffed and went out. The child never remembered! Then it must be a regular thing. She was breaking her heart about something, and she—Bessie—knew well enough what it was.

Henry had started making invitation lists. He would pore over the Social Register, and he took to making small memoranda of his own in the car, using the backs of old envelopes for the purpose and then mislaying them.

"Now where the mischief did I put that? I thought of two or three people today that I don't want to forget."

In time the wedding clothes began to come in; boxes from French shops containing sets of chemise, abbreviated little bloomers and nightdress to match, in palest shades of chiffon; tea gowns and négligées over which Nora folded her hands and turned up her eyes in ecstasy; evening wraps, sport frocks, dinner gowns, ball dresses.