Before I had an opportunity to get another letter to him, Mr. Harding came over to New York. He telephoned me at school and made an appointment for me to meet him at the Manhattan Hotel, at Madison Avenue and 42nd Street. What a sweet shock to hear his voice! . . .
He was standing on the steps of the hotel when I reached there.
It must be remembered that I was but sixteen years of age when I had last seen Mr. Harding (the time I called at his house to congratulate him upon his election to the Senate) and, although I looked very young when I met him at the Manhattan Hotel, still I had had the advantage of the intervening two years, and the added advantage of having lived with the Carters from whom I had learned a great deal, and I am sure Mr. Harding's agreeable surprise was genuine. Certainly he could not have been more cordial.
He invited me to come back to the reception room near 43rd Street. It was about 10:30 in the morning. We sat down upon a settee and it was not difficult for me to talk to him for he invited confidence. We became immediately reminiscent of my childhood and my adoration of him, and he seemed immensely pleased that I still retained such feelings. I could not help being perfectly frank.
Some kind of convention in New York at that time had made hotel accommodations very scarce, and Mr. Harding confessed that he was obliged to take the one room available in the Manhattan Hotel—the bridal chamber! He asked me to come up there with him so that we might continue our conversation without interruptions or annoyances.
The bridal chamber of the Manhattan Hotel was, to me, a very lovely room, and, in view of the fact that we had scarcely closed the door behind us when we shared our first kiss, it
