“But, good gracious,” said my Aunt Bridget, “who would have imagined you didn’t know.  I thought every girl in the world knew before she put up her hair and came out of short frocks.  My Betsy did, I’m sure of that.  And to think that you—­you whom we thought so cute, so cunning. . . .  Mary O’Neill, I’m ashamed of you.  I really, really am!  Why, you goose” (Aunt Bridget was again trying to laugh), “how did you suppose the world went on?”

The coarse ridicule of what was supposed to be my maidenly modesty cut me like a knife, but I could not permit myself to explain, so my Aunt Bridget ran on talking.

“I see how it has been.  It’s the fault of that Reverend Mother at the convent.  What sort of a woman is she?  Is she a woman at all, I wonder, or only a piece of stucco that ought to be put up in a church corner!  To think she could have you nine years and never say one word about. . . .  Well, well!  What has she been doing with you?  Talking about the mysteries, I suppose—­prayers and retreats and novenas, and the spiritual bridegroom and the rest of it, while all the while. . . .  But you must put the convent out of your head, my girl.  You are a married woman now.  You’ve got to think of your husband, and a husband isn’t a spiritual bridegroom I can tell you.  He’s flesh and blood, that’s what a husband is, and you can’t expect him to spend his time talking about eternity and the rosary.  Not on his wedding-day, anyway.”

I was hot in my absurd embarrassment, and I dare say my face was scarlet, but Aunt Bridget showed me no mercy.

“The way you have behaved is too silly for anything. . . .  It really is.  A husband’s a husband, and a wife’s a wife.  The wife has to obey her husband.  Of course she has.  Every wife has to.  Some don’t like it.  I can’t say that I liked it very much myself.  But to think of anybody objecting.  Why, it’s shocking!  Nobody ever heard of such a thing.”

I must have flushed up to my forehead, for I became conscious that in my Aunt Bridget’s eyes there had been a kind of indecency in my conduct.

“But, come,” she said, “we must be sensible.  It’s timidity, that’s what it is.  I was a little timid myself when I was first married, but I soon got over it.  Once get over your timidity and you will be all right.  Sakes alive, yes, you’ll be as happy as the day is long, and before this time to-morrow you’ll wonder what on earth you made all this fuss about.”

I tried to say that what she predicted could never be, because I did not love my husband, and therefore . . . but my Aunt Bridget broke in on me, saying: 

“Mary O’Neill, don’t be a fool.  Your maiden days are over now, and you ought to know what your husband will do if you persist.”

I jumped at the thought that she meant he would annul our marriage, but that was not what she was thinking of.