Summer

by Edith Wharton

Her five minutes face to face with Mr. Royall had stripped her of her last illusion, and brought her back to North Dormer’s point of view. Distinctly and pitilessly there rose before her the fate of the girl who was married “to make things right.” She had seen too many village love stories end in that way. Poor Rose Coles’s miserable marriage was of the number; and what good had come of it for her or for Halston Skeff? They had hated each other from the day the minister married them; and whenever old Mrs. Skeff had a fancy to humiliate her daughter-in-law she had only to say: “Who’d ever think the baby’s only two? And for a seven months’ child—ain’t it a wonder what a size he is?” North Dormer had treasures of indulgence for brands in the burning, but only derision for those who succeeded in getting snatched from it; and Charity had always understood Julia Hawes’s refusal to be snatched. . . .