“I should hope not! Over eighty, isn’t she? Well, you’ll molder if you have to live here much longer. Mother says she’s leaving everything to you, and I hope you’ll sell this old tomb and buy something over in Chelsea—no, I take that back. Even I’d keep this house if I had it. All it needs is new furniture and not so much woods.” She took off her hat and threw it on the floor. Gita, now that this fashionable extinguisher was removed, saw how completely beautiful she was. Such locks as had been spared by the shears curled naturally about her face. She had a charming little head alertly poised; her forehead was low and full, her delicate nose a straight line, her curved mouth soft and pink, with happy corners. She looked sweet and innocent and utterly charming and as cool and pure as an arum lily; but Gita was wary of judging by Nature’s irrelevancies. And she had heard her San Francisco friends discuss these Eastern girls. “Hard-boiled, my dear, doesn’t express it. They’d turn nails green. We’re little ba-bas beside ’em.” “Surely you go out occasionally?” asked Miss Pleyden anxiously. “Oh, yes, I go for a long walk every day. The salt marshes fascinate me, and I never saw anything like the Boardwalk. It is rather amusing.” “Amusing is the word for it until you’re tired of looking at people you never see anywhere else. Ever see the Digue at Ostend?” “Oh . . . yes!” But Gita scowled. She had particularly unpleasant memories of Ostend. Her father had gambled away his last sou in the Kursaal, and been obliged to sneak out in the night as he could not meet his I.O.U’s. And one of his friends! Gentlemen! Carterets! “Well, don’t look so tragic about it—I’m going to call you Gita and you must call me Polly—at once. Time was, I’m told, when we Atlantans were cold and formal, but that’s ancient history. Our poor parents try to keep it up, but they’ve given _us_ up. And then you are one of us,” she added, sincerely casual. “Are you engaged?” “No!” “That’s right. Plenty of time. We don’t have to marry these days for the sake of freedom, and life’s one long dream when you haven’t a responsibility and can do as you please. Thank heaven I was born twenty years ago, not forty. Moreover, I’m waiting until the men get over prohibition and stop acting like naughty boys. I hate the sight of a hip-pocket. Some of the girls drink because they think it’s funny or think the men think they like it. But I’m afraid I’d go blind or something or come out in a rash. Believe in keeping one’s head, too.” “Rather! Life’s hard enough without looking round for ways to make it harder.”