morrow.
Don't you usually wait a bit?"

Her mother noticed that there was no hypothesis--no "wouldn't
be"--about it. She saw no good in a conflict. The girl was twenty,
the man probably twelve or more years older; there was nothing, she
almost regretfully admitted, to be said against him; they had seemed
good chums. Most mothers would have been delighted, for he was making
himself a name as a novelist. Yet she was not, for he had come with
this preposterously worded letter to wreck all her plans. She had
thought him so safe, from the mere fact that he had no romance or
sentiment about him. He was so safe, yes, for Helena; a real platonic
friendship; opening her eyes a little to the bigger world outside, but
altogether to be trusted not to put ridiculous ideas into her head. He
was the first man with whom she had ever trusted Helena at all alone,
and now----!

"Mother," laughed Helena, suddenly clasping her fondly round the neck,
"I can see from your cross face you _do_ mean to be troublesome! Now
just be good instead and say that we may be at any rate engaged? It
will be such fun, and we can see then how we feel about it."

Mrs. Hallam by now knew with all certainty that she was weak. She felt
a vague sense of relief that Helena had asked permission; at one moment
she had not expected that.... If she refused it, what would be the
end? Possibly elopement, suicide, or some other of those awful means
that modern girls employed so freely.... Whereas if she said yes, she
still retained her grip as mother and might use what authority she had
to disillusion slowly this girl, who looked on her engagement as mere
fun.

"Very well, my own dear daughter," she said and suddenly found herself
crying.

To Helena also things had turned out otherwise than she expected. She
had not ever thought that she would get her mother's leave. For one
moment it was almost a shock! She felt suddenly thrust out beyond
recall upon a journey all mysterious to her. She was not sure, now,
that she ever meant to do more than assert her right to do just as she
wanted.

Did she want to marry Hubert Brett? She was not really sure.

She wanted certainly to get away from Home....

Five more years of this--that was what her mother hinted at--five more
years of being ignorant, of seeing no one, knowing nothing about
anything that mattered, being just your mother's daughter--five more
wasted years!...

So that, after having dried h