She told me how she had been instrumental in making a match
between her friend, Harriet Atkinson and a young scion of an ancient
and haughty family of Charleston, and how after the marriage her
friend's health had begun to give way, until now she was an utter
wreck, living alone in a dilapidated antebellum mansion, seeing no
one but negro servants, and praying for death to relieve her of her
misery.
"Of course, I don't really know," said Sylvia. "Perhaps it was
this--this disease that you speak of. None of my people would tell
me--I doubt if they really know themselves. It was just before my
own wedding, so you can understand it had a painful effect upon me.
It happened that I read something in a magazine, and I thought
that--that possibly my fianc?e--that someone ought to ask him, you
understand--"
She stopped, and the blood was crimson in her cheeks, with the
memory of her old excitement, and some fresh excitement added to it.
There are diseases of the mind as well as of the body, and one of
them is called prudery.
"I can understand," I said. "It was certainly your right to be
reassured on such a point."
"Well, I tried to talk to my Aunt Varina about it; then I wrote to
Uncle Basil, and asked him to write to Douglas.
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