# The President's Daughter (Britton)/Chapter 118

Shortly after I had pawned my wedding ring and had bought Elizabeth Ann some new clothes, I had a letter from Miss Daisy Harding, saying she was to be in New York soon to do some shopping. I surmised that she would soon be married to Ralph Lewis and in truth learned afterward from her that the trip East was for the purpose of purchasing linens, and certain garments to complete her trousseau.
Even the knowledge that my child's aunt was, according to her own written statement to me months before, liberally cared for as a result of her brother Warren's will, did not cause me for one moment then to consider as advisable or proper an appeal to her for financial assistance. Moreover, I had launched myself upon matrimonial waters, and, though I knew the craft which carried my child and me appeared to be headed toward the rocks, there was still hope.
While in the city, Miss Harding stopped with a girlhood friend whose father had been a prominent judge in Ohio. They lived at Broadway and 71st Street in an apartment building, and it was there that I took Elizabeth Ann one afternoon to call upon Miss Harding. Helen Anderson, who had always wanted to meet Miss Harding, about whom she had heard me speak so often, went with us.
I was glad it was cold enough to warrant my wearing my winter coat, which was trimmed with the squirrel from the coat Mr. Harding had given me the money to buy back in 1920. Thus I looked as presentable as my child. Pride would not yet allow me to admit to certain people that in less than a year I had found that, in my instance, marriage was a failure. I could not in the same breath confess I had married for a home for my child, and without such explanation I would be stamped mercenary, and rightly so.
I do not know whether the explanation I offered Miss Harding ​in extenuation of Elizabeth Ann's separation from her foster parents sufficed to satisfy her natural speculation about the situation. I do remember, however, that we repaired for a little private chat, toward the end of our visit, to the play-room of the little daughter, where she and Elizabeth Ann had been playing together, and I remember distinctly that I made a broad statement to the effect that if I ever for a good reason found I could not live with my husband, I would not hesitate a moment to seek my freedom. And Daisy Harding, standing there before me, not yet a bride, echoed my statement.
When we returned to the other room, I called Elizabeth Ann and told her that we must go, but she and the little girl were having such a gay time that she was loath to leave, much less put on the little kid gloves which meant the final touch for leave-taking. And the joy of the whole visit for me was summed up in seeing her "aunt Daisy"—as unknown to her as such as she herself was unknown to Miss Harding as Warren Harding's child—coax her little hands into the gloves and talk to her in a low voice which in the quality of its sweetness was much like her brother's. And I could tell, though Elizabeth Ann's back was turned to me, that she was looking straight into Miss Harding's eyes with the same sweet seriousness which was in her father's eyes when he talked to me about our child.