Marcia was staring at me. "So all right," she said. "Paul's just a little kid. He's not even a good boyfriend. Too jittery. I thought I could teach him. He doesn't really want to learn. He thinks a dame is made of soap bubbles and lives on a pedestal a mile high. He thinks sex is something for pack trips in the mountains and spruce boughs. I got sick to death of his pack-trip monologue! Who wouldn't? Lying with a guy on a good inner-spring mattress and listening to him yak about pine needles! Drenching myself in cologne--and hearing him rave about stable smells! I was ready to spring myself, when we had that lunch. And you gave me the excuse. I'd saved up mad enough for six girls--and I let him have it." "He asked for it." "Did he!" "But you gave him the wrong medicine. Why didn't you tell him it wasn't the disapproval of an uncle--the looks to come from men--but--the spruce routine?" "Haven't you any feelings? That was his dream. Why louse that up, too? Let him dream! Someday, God knows, he may even meet one of those spruce-loving dopes with cute little things in her flannel blouse and her jodhpurs. Let him have her! I got tired of my uptown personality the minute I realized it led straight to the Rocky Mountains--and the farther from camp the better." "He grew up in the West." "Pardon my spurs!" Tears filled her eyes. "I'm a sap, too. For a while--I really was in heaven. I really thought--this is love. Ye gods! What can happen to people who should know better is--unfair to humanity! And then I began looking for an out. I worked. Sure. Honest working wife--for a couple of weeks. Then--working wife has lunch with the floor manager--in a hotel room rented for the lunch. One club sandwich--and one good, busy change from Paul. Then the stockboy--a hot-looking wop with long hair--took me out in his department to show me the new materials--and the place was deserted. So I knew I was a sap!" I thought that over. "I'm glad you told me. I know how it is. I don't mind. It's you--and that's that. But there's one thing I wish you'd do. Write Paul a letter. Don't try to teach him a lesson by letting him see you here. He'd just tear up the place--or maybe hurt you--" "We've got a boy in the kitchen to take care of rough stuff."