<div style="text-align: justify;">Mary Ann knew full well that she should have restrained her curiosity. She had just set foot in the house, and was going to marry into it, after all. She should probably be discreet and not mess with anything. Of course, that was not what she did. Mary Ann’s curiosity had gotten the best of her, and she was still unsure of whether or not she regretted it. <br/><br/>She might regret it later, but for now, Mary Ann was very curious about the painting, and about everything else that involved her future husband. <br/><br/>Looking at the painting gave Mary Ann an uneasy feeling. It wasn’t a bad painting, artistically, of course. It was just disturbing, and the ideas it evoked were not happy ones. <br/><br/>She was leaning just a little closer when that voice startled her. Turning around, Mary Ann looked to see who was the person who had just spoken.<br/><br/>Sighing in relief when she noticed the young man didn’t seem to be angry, Mary Ann listened as he spoke, only nodding when he asked if she was the woman who would be marrying his uncle. Hearing more about her husband to be was disheartening. So she was marrying a self-involved man who would be very likely to look down on her simply for being herself. Quite the marital bliss.<br/><br/>Valentine’s words about Samuel not having to speak to <span style="font-style: italic">‘this woman’</span> were more unpleasant to Mary Ann than she had expected. She had not expected anything better than that, but still… it just made the whole idea of marrying that man make her feel even worse and lonelier. Maybe it wouldn't be as bad, though, as long as Samuel was there. Not that she thought of him in a romantic sense. She had never thought about anyone this way, after all. No, he would just be a kindly soul who would, perhaps, help her to avoid despair. <br/><br/>When Samuel left, Mary Ann swallowed hard. She held her hands together, feeling like a school child being questioned by a professor. It wasn’t a comfortable feeling at all. Yet, she took some minor comfort in the idea that Valentine didn’t expect much from her. Her best would either do or it wouldn’t, but it was less horrible to know that he almost expected her to fail. <br/><br/>“I did look at the painting”, she replied sincerely. “I was curious about it”, the young woman admitted. One thing she was not as a liar, and she wasn’t ashamed to admit that she had looked at the strange painting. Yet, at his order, she looked at it again, ignoring the discomfort it caused her. “Your nephew said the baby symbolizes society, and the woman, what came before. It might be an interpretation, but I cannot help to think of two others”, she started, her voice quiet and serious.<br/><br/>After a pause and a glance at her father - who made a gesture for her to stop, which she ignored -, Mary Ann carried on. “First, I do think the child may represent society, but with the woman representing well… women, or the female condition, as we are suffocated and choked by what our society expects from us”. She paused again to collect her thoughts on the next interpretation. She knew it would be something a proper woman should not say, especially to the man she was about to marry. But she did not expect this marriage to be a real one, anyway. “On the other hand, the baby may be a representation of motherhood, again with the woman being a representation of the female condition, as motherhood sucks out the entire life out of a woman”, she stated in a somewhat sharp intonation. It was obvious she wasn’t even trying to please Valentine this time. <br/><br/>The young woman’s father looked horrified, and was already prepared to be ordered to get his wicked daughter and leave with her.</div>