Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-08-12
And So They
We're Married
BY HAZEL DEYO BACHELOR
Copyright, 1919. BY. Publio Ledger Co.
START THE STORY TODAY

DEATRICE's face was radiant. 1t
l seemed uplifted by something from
within. Gone was the affected ennui
that Beatrice had used that first eve
ming when she had wanted to appear
blase and world weary, gone were the
hard young lines that had marred her
face at breakfast that morning. She
looked like a radiant young girl just
as she was intended to look, natural
and sweet.
Ruth smiled involuntarily into the
girlish face. She felt years older than
Beatrice Moore, even the youth of the
late twenties has not that fairy tale
aspect that the youth of twenty one is
brimming over with.
''Something wonderful has happened
to me-" Beatrice said softly, some
!. thing so splendid that am ashamed of
ever being unworthy of it, that is why
I hurried up here as soon as l could.
Can't you guess what it is?'
Ruth shook her head slowly.
I'm engaged"
Beatrice, not really
Eyes, / am
"When did this happen?'
"This morning
''To Bob Edwards?'
Beatrice nodded slowly.
s'Can you be little glad for me in
spite of my having been so nasty?' She
spoke like a wistful child afraid lest
any one mar her blissful happiness by
being cross with her, no matter how
we'll deserved.
Ruth was all gladness, all response.
"Glad for you? OF course 1 am. !
think it's splendid"
"You don't think I'm too young?
There was a question in this.
''Not to be engaged" Ruth returned
promptly. "Of course, you needn't be
married yet.
ooh, but I want to be married. We
want to wait six months and then have
our wedding. Bob says we'll be sorry
twenty years from now that we wasted
any time just now. 'Nou're married,
Mrs. Raymond, you understand. l told
father you would
SO this was why Beatrice was being
so utterly sweet. Ruth thought quickly.
1t was different now, everything was
changed since Beatrice had become en-
gagged. She was no longer the poised
young leader of the younger set with
half dozen swains swarming around
her, she was just woman, very young
and unsophisticated and eager to be a
disciple of girl not too much older
than she was, not too old to have out
grown the impulses of youth and to
mother had.
Ruth wanted to tell Beatrice to hold
Ion to her courtship days with both slim
hands for they would never come again,
and although married life might bring
greater experience, it also brought other
things, MISUNDERSTANDING. little hurts
and most of all that fearful habit of
becoming too accustomed to each other.
i Bob Edwards was n nice boy, but an
awful cub. He and Beatrice were in
4 love. just now they saw each other only
at the most advantageous times. They
had not yet tried the experiment of
living together in one apartment, see
ing each other across the table three
times a day, enduring together all the
little petty details that so successfully
ROD lie OF all romance.
When Beatrice finally danced out of
the room, Ruth was sure of one thing
and that was that Beatrice was no
longer hostile. This fact was relief
but in that face of other impending
things it somehow seemed small. There
was George Everett to be considered.
Ruth had started little Irritation with
him to punish Grace Lovett, but she
had no idea of making the boy fall
in love with her. This was tragic.
What had he wanted to say to her
in the hall? He had said, "Let me tel
you how much I care for you?" Did
that mean that he wanted to tell her he
loved her? Had he any nonsense of that
lind in his head? Then there was Scott
lot only the wall of misunderstanding
lat had been erected between them.
BIT the fact that Scott might genuinely
ire for Dot Salisbury, that she might
ave awakened his feelings with her
einty tricks, with the flattery of her
reference for him. Even if he did not
b care for her deeply, the fact that Scott
might stoop to a Irritation with an
other woman, to perhaps kiss her, would
tear away all the trust and faith that
Ruth had in life.
Ruth in looking at the experiences
OF any other young married couple
would have been able to see more than
!, she did in her own. She would have
5, observed things impersonally, she would
not have been SO quick to misinterpret
trifes, she would have known that
where there is love and more than love
thorough understanding, nothing very
big can go wrong.
lTomorrOH. Ruth moves herself the