Book Four The Bruising of the Wings Chapter 10 Plighted Troth

"I don't know what they are."

"You don't want to know what they are. You mustn't know. It's an ordeal so terrible that most creditors employ it only as a last resort, especially against a woman. This plaintiff, being herself a woman, is less merciful."

"Why is it so terrible? I have no money; they can't make me pay what I haven't got, can they? Is it the Inquisition?"

"Yes, of a sort; it's an inquiry into your ability to pay, and almost no question that could throw light upon that is barred. You'll be asked about your business in New York, your income and expenses, your family and your father's means. It will be a turning inside out of your most intimate affairs."

"Why, I should expect all that," I said.

"But, Nelly--" he hesitated. "You're alone here?"

He had not before alluded to Mrs. Whitney, though I suppose he understood that she had gone; I appreciated his delicacy.

"I'm afraid you'll be asked about that," he went on; "asked, I mean, how a young woman without money maintains a fine apartment. They'll inquire about your servants, the daily expenses of your table, your wine bills, if you ever have any; then they'll question you about your visitors, their character and number, and try to wring admissions from you, and to give sinister shades to innocent relations. The reporters will all be there, a swarm of them. You're a semi-public character, more's the pity, and some lawyers like to be known for their severity to debtors. What a field day for the press! The beautiful Miss Winship in supplementary proceedings-- columns of testimony, pages of pictures--! Ugh! In a word, the experience is so severe that you cannot undergo it."