And standing dutifully at her mother's side
until she saw the pen make a period, made then her momentous
announcement, much in the tone she would have used had it been to the
effect that she was going to the matinee with him that afternoon.
Mrs. Stanton said, "What, dear?" indifferently enough, just in
mechanical response to the matter-of-fact inflection of Rosalind's
voice. Then she laid down her pen, smiled in a puzzled way up into her
daughter's face, and added, "My ears must have played me a funny trick.
What did you say?"
Rose repeated: "Rodney Aldrich and I are going to be married."
But when she saw a look of painful incomprehension in her mother's face,
she sat down on the arm of the chair, slid a strong arm around the
fragile figure and hugged it up against herself.
"I suppose," she observed contritely, "that I ought to have broken it
more gradually. But I never think of things like that."
As well as she could, her mother resisted the embrace.
"I can't believe," she said, gripping the edge of her desk with both
hands, "that you would jest about a solemn subject like that, Rose, and
yet it's incredible!.
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