She did not answer, but when I turned to go, to my surprise, she stepped forward and walked at my side. "Why do you come here alone?" she asked shyly, lifting a pensive questioning face. "Because I am tired of all this tawdry noise. But you," I said, "surely you are not tired of it? You cannot have been here long." "No," she replied, "I have not. Only thirty days"; and her blue eyes gleamed with childish pride. "And that is why you seem so different from them all?" Timidly she placed her hand upon my arm. "So you," she said gratefully, "you understand that I am not like them-that is, not yet." "You do not act like them," I replied, "and what is more, you act as if you did not want to be like them. It surely cannot be merely that you are new here. The other girls when they come seem so eager for this life, to which they have long been trained. Were you not trained for it also?" "Yes," she admitted, "they tried to train me for it, but they could not kill my artist's soul, for I was not like these others, born of a strain wherein women can only be mothers, or, if rejected for that, come here. I was born to be a musician, a group where women may be something more than mere females." "Then why are you here?" I asked. "Because," she faltered, "my voice was imperfect. I have, you see, the soul of an artist but lack the physical means to give that soul expression. And so they transferred me to the school for free women, where I have been courted by the young men of the Royal House. But of course you understand all that." "Yes," I said, "I know something of it; but my work has always so absorbed me that I have not had time to think of these matters. In fact, I come to the Free Level much less than most men." For a moment, it seemed, her eyes hardened in cunning suspicion, but as I returned her intent gaze I could fathom only the doubts and fears of childish innocence. "Please let us sit down," I said; "it is so beautiful here; and then tell me all about yourself, how you have lived your childhood, and what your problems are. It may be that I can help you."