"Well, I always congratulated myself on being free from sentimentality," Sylvia said. "But beside you I'm like a keepsake-album." "If you'd get out of the habit of thinking that death is of any more importance than going to sleep, you wouldn't bother about anything," Mère Gontran declared. "Oh, it isn't death that worries me," Sylvia answered. "It's life." Very early in the twilight of a wet dawn Sylvia started for Kieff. All day she watched the raindrops trickling down the windows of the railway carriage and wondered if her impulse to travel south was inspired by any profounder reason. CHAPTER III On the day after she reached Kieff Sylvia went for a walk by herself. Since she was going to stay only a week in this city and since she still felt somewhat remote from the world after her long seclusion, she had not bothered to make friends with any of her fellow-_artistes_. Presently she grew tired of walking alone and, looking about her, she saw on the other side of the road a cinema theater, where she decided to spend the rest of a dreary afternoon. She was surprised to find that the lowest charge for entrance was two rubles; but when she went inside and saw the film, she understood the reason. The theater was full of men, and she could hear them whispering to one another their astonishment at seeing a woman enter the place; she was thankful that the dim red light concealed her blushes, and she escaped as quickly as possible, quenching the impulse to abuse the doorkeeper for not warning her what kind of an entertainment was taking place inside.