“In the closet, dearie, just a little. That's a good girl. Mama's so dry.” She rose, the silver cup of the flask in her hand, and moved inevitably to the mirror. “My hair's a sight,” she remarked; “all strings. I believe I'll get a permanent wave. They say it lasts for six months or more, till the ends grow out. Makes a lot of it, too, and holds the front together. If you've ever had dye in your hair, I hear, it will break off like grass.” Linda pondered over what she had been told of love and marriage; on the whole the exposition had been unsatisfactory. The latter she was able to grasp, but her mother had admitted an inability exactly to fix love. One fact, apparently, was clear--it was a nuisance and a hindrance to happiness, or rather to success. Love upset things. Still she had the strongest objection possible to living forever with a man like Mr. Moses Feldt. At once all that she had hoped for from life grew flat and uninteresting. She had no doubt of her mother's correctness and wisdom; the world was like that; she must make the best of it. There was some telephoning, inquiries, and she heard the elder make an appointment with a hair-dresser for three that afternoon. She wondered what it would be like to have your hair permanently waved and hoped that she would see it done. This, too, she realized, was a part of the necessity of always considering men--they liked your hair to be wavy. Hers was as straight and stupid as possible. She, in turn, examined herself in a mirror: the black bang fell exactly to her eyebrows, her face had no color other than the carnation of her lips and her deep blue eyes. She moved away and critically studied her figure; inches and inches too thin, she decided. Undoubtedly her mother was right, and she must marry at the first opportunity--if she could find a man, a rich man, who was willing. Her thoughts returned vaguely to the mystery, the nuisance, of love. Surely she had heard something before, immensely important, about it, and totally different from all her mother had said. Her mind was filled with the fantastic image of a forest, of dangers, and a fat china figure with curled plumes, a nodding head, that brushed her with fear and disgust. A shuddering panic took possession of her, flashes burned before her eyes, and she ran gasping to the perfumed soft reassurances of her mother. IX