Marriage -- Fiction; New York (N.Y.) -- Social life and customs -- Fiction
She did not see Mrs. Grewe again, she did not want to see her. It was
not until from the telephone girl she learned that the charming young
widow was gone, that Ethel went up to her new home. In a little while
her furniture would begin to pour in, but as yet the rooms were empty,
flooded with warm sunshine. She looked about and thought of the life
which had been here, and then of Mrs. Grewe's advice and her last
smiling admonition. She could almost hear the voice.
"Is every place I live in to be haunted?" Ethel asked herself. And then
with a humorous little scowl: "Now see here, young woman, the sooner you
learn that every apartment in this city has a complete equipment of
ghosts, the better it will be for you. I don't care who lived here, nor
how she lived nor what she said. I don't need her advice, and her life
is not to affect mine in the slightest!" She stopped short. Of whom was
she speaking, Mrs. Grewe or Amy? There were two of them now! Both had
given her advice, and in each case the life portrayed had been very much
alike, so much so as to be rather disturbing. Things were certainly
queer in this town!
"Very well, my dears," she said amiably, "if I must be haunted, it's
much more gay and sociable to have two instead of one. Remember tea
will be served at five, and from the present outlook there's little
chance of our being disturbed by the intrusion of any live woman in New
York."
"At least the ghosts are friendly." She suddenly compressed her lips and
looked about: "However!" She went to the telephone in the hall: "Please
hurry up those porters! I'm up here waiting to begin!"
And in the days that followed, she was far too engrossed in "settling"
to spare any time for brooding on phantoms. "A home of my own and a
life of my own, to be lived with my own husband!" But when at last they
were settled, and Joe in a dear, genial mood had gone about admiring,
and taking no notice apparently of the scarcity of Amy's things--he
turned to Ethel with an air which was meant to be easy and natural:
"Well, now that we're taking a fresh start, the time has come for a
little talk."
"What about?" she asked, endeavouring to make her smile as easy as his.
"It will take about one minute." His gruff voice was low and kind. "I'm
not going to force my friends on you. If you want to make friends of
your own, go ahead. And when you get them let me know--and they'll be
mine, too, if I have to break a leg in the effort. I'll dance in front
of them, so to speak, until they're all enchanted. But in the meantime,
on your side, I want you to let me down easy with these people I once
knew. I don't want to hurt them or be a cad. A few I may keep in touch
with for years."
"Fanny!" flashed into Ethel's mind.
"And all I ask of you is this. You'll soon be going away for the
summer. Let's do the decent thing--just once--and have a little party
here. I give you my word we won't do it again."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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