But it was not Richard Darcy who tiptoed in. The lamp beside her bed clicked on, revealing a good deal of the former Mrs. Calloway in a marvellous nightgown, her golden head as carefully coiffed as for a ball. "Major's off and going strong," she announced, "so I slipped away to see how you were gettin' on, dearie. I Had a kind of feelin' you wouldn't be asleep yet. I'm like that myself in a strange bed.... Look here," her voice changed as she saw the white and miserable face among the pillows--"you aren't holding it against your papa and me, girlie, because we sprung this on you as a surprise? I _told_ Major we ought to wait till you came home! But it was you who introduced us, you know; and I knew it would be all right as soon as we got to know each other better. And Major wouldn't hear to waiting, was bound and determined to have me just as soon as he could get me. Men,"--she laughed her plump, merry laugh--"are such babies when it comes to havin' what they want right away, ain't they?" "Are they?" said Joan dully. "You take it from me they are! A man that doesn't want you quick don't want you at all. And I must say your father needed marryin' more than any one I _ever_ saw! Spots all over his clothes, and that shiny in the back you could see your face in him. Your mother must have had a time keepin' that man neat! Besides, if we'd waited till you came, what would we have done with you on the honeymoon? Not," she added coyly, "that it's over yet, by any means! When he was on his death-bed Calloway said to me, says he, 'Effie May, our honeymoon never has been over, has it?' Some women are that way, just naturally affectionate and fond of makin' men feel at home. And both of us were real lonesome.... You don't blame me for marrying Major, do you?" she finished rather wistfully. Joan said after a long pause, "No, I don't think I blame you, Mrs. Calloway." The other gave an unexpected squeal of mirth. "Goodness' sakes, don't call me _that_! If you don't feel like callin' me 'mamma' yet"--(there was a hopeful pause, which Joan did not fill)--"then you might as well call me Effie May. I'm not so awfully much older than you, I guess--I was only sixteen when I eloped with my first. But there's one thing I wanted to tell you"--(her voice lost its confident note and became rather shy). "I married your father as much to get you as to get him, dearie. A man's easy enough to pick up anywhere, goodness knows! if you've got the looks. But a child--" she sighed. "That's something else again. I used to think I'd like to adopt one, only Calloway didn't want to be bothered--Say, it was more fun than anything I've ever done in my life, shopping for lawngerie and little models and all, and telling the girls in the stores they were for my little girl just coming home from boarding-school!..."