Wellesley, dignified and gracious, fascinated me. We went up to the college and spent a happy half-day there with one of the professors who had been a school friend of Bill's, no, our Mother's. But I couldn't help thinking of Mercedes! My bright, tropical bird, caged in a classroom, filing to chapel with hundreds of other girls, part of a crowd. I determined to go some day to Vassar and see her Waterloo for myself. Pride's Crossing filled me with envy. I liked the beautifully kept lawns and the wonderful, garden-encircled houses. But I fell so deeply in love with Gloucester, even the fish, that Bill despaired of ever getting me away. "Wait till you see Salem!" he said, "I'll probably have to tuck a door in the back-seat. You'll want one, I know. Jolliest doors in the world." Magnolia, Salem, Plymouth, they went by like dreams. The big hotels where we stayed, the water, the Spring skies, the first reticent flowers, and finally, the funny little Cape towns: Hyannis Port, with its beaches and docks, its high Sunset Hill, where we watched the sun go down red and purple over the quiet bay, and where we saw the white sails of the fishing-crafts lift like wings against the morning sky--it was all so lovely, so new, so untarnished for me. I even loved the grey fog that swept in at night, like soft veils. And everywhere, serious or gay, always the perfect comrade, was Bill. I would lie awake in the mornings listening to him splash in the shower or whistling to himself in his room, not calling out good morning to him for five whole minutes, just happy at having him so near. But Provincetown! We came into it on a wonderful, clear morning, into that sleepy, little town, girdled with sand, on the edge of the wide, blue bay. Some of the cottages were open, even as early as it was in the season, and the little streets were bright with people. Our Inn was close down on the beach, a dark-red, rambling building, built half a century before, and beautifully remodelled for modern purposes. There were ships' lanterns and clocks within, a wide, glassed verandah on which one consumed quantities of delicious food and salt air, a ship's rope for the banister of the stairway which led, steeply, up to the second floor. Beyond the landing was my room, with three great windows fronting the bay. One could almost have flung a stone into the water from them. The room was in rose-color, like my own room at home, and cool, dull green. Counter-pane, chair cushions, curtains, and dressing-table rioted with delightfully impossible roses, and the whole room smelled of salt and sun and the little lavender and rose-leaf bags I found in bureau-drawers and on closet-shelves. And my bath was big and white, a tiled, immaculate room, with cross-stitched towels and washrags, sweet-scented soaps and a dazzling array of bottles and toothbrush-mugs.