How string arrays stored in memory?

I know when I make an integer array like below, each item has a particular size and each of them occupies a particular space of memory (e.g. 32 bits).

int[] i = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5};

memory
[addr] [val] [size]
[1000] [1] [32 bit]
[1001] [2] [32 bit]
[1002] [3] [32 bit]
[1003] [4] [32 bit]
[1004] [5] [32 bit]

But when we have a string array like bellow which has different strings with different sizes, how compiler store them into the memory?

string[] words = {
    "Hi",
    "Foo",
    "Alphabet",
};
Console.WriteLine (words[2]);

// output is "Alphabet"

First, I thought each item occupies memory as big as the largest item, so I changed the second string to something larger than the largest item to see what will happen.

string[] words = {
    "Hi",
    "Hopelessness",
    "Alphabet",
};
Console.WriteLine (words[2]);

// output is still "Alphabet"

But as you can see the third string is still safe from collision.
– why this happened?
– Does compiler store items to different spaces? If so, doesn’t it lower the speed of access to items in a large array?

>Solution :

string[] words = {
    "Hi",
    "Hopelessness",
    "Alphabet",
};

laid out like this

words=>|Ref1|Ref2|Ref3|
         |    |     |
         |    |      > "Hi"
         |     > "Hopelessness"
          > "Alphabet"

‘words’ is an array of references to strings. a reference is basically a smart pointer. The actual strings are in the heap and the references point to them