oort, and got
into the car. It was possible at that hour to deal with the Avenue as a
street and not as a rest-cure interrupted by short spurts.

"Would you rather the windows were up, Gehane?" he asked, looking at
her through his long lashes.

"No. The air's full of new ferns. But why Gehane?"

"You remind me of her, and I'm pretty certain that you also could do
your hair in the same two long braids. Given the chance, I can see you
developing into some-thing like medievalism and joining the ranks of
women who loved greatly."

They passed the Plaza with all its windows gleaming, like a giant's
house in a fairy tale.

Joan shook her head. "No," she said. "No. I'm just the last word of
this very minute. Everybody in America for a hundred and fifty years
has worked to make me. I'm the reward of mighty effort. I'm the
dream-child of the pioneers, as far removed from them as the chimney of
the highest building from the rock on which it's rooted."

Palgrave laughed a little. "It appears that you did some thinking out
there in your country cage."

"Thinking! That's all I had to do! I spent a lifetime standing on the
hill with the woods behind me trying to catch the music of this street,
the sound of this very car, and I thought it all out, every bit of it."

"Every bit of what?"

"Life and death and the great hereafter," she said, "principally life.
That's why I'm going out to dinner with you instead of going early to
bed."

The glare of a lamp silvered her profile and the young curve of her
bosom. Somewhere, at some time, Palgrave had knelt humbly, with strange
anguish and hunger, at the feet of a girl with just that young proud
face and those unawakened eyes. The memory of it was like an echo of an
echo.

"Why," said Joan, halting for a moment on her way to the steps of the
old hotel, "this looks like a picture postcard of a bit of Paris."

"Yes, on the other side of the Seine, near the Odeon. Our grandfathers
imagined that they were very smart when they stayed here. It's one of
the few places in town that has atmosphere."

"I like it," said Joan.

The hall was alive with people, laughing and talking, and the walls
with the rather bold designs of the posters. A band, which made up in
vim and go what it lacked in numbers, was playing a selection from "The
Chocolate Soldier." The place was full of the smell of garlic and
cigarette smoke and coffee. There was a certain dramatic animation
among the waiters, ch