They were both relieved by the withdrawal of the girl, Hennessey because he wanted to talk business, Pinckney because her presence had affected him like a wet blanket. His first impression of Phyl had been delightful, then, little by little, her stiffness and seeming lifelessness had communicated themselves to him. It seemed to him that he had never met a duller or more awkward schoolgirl. His mind was of that quick order which requires to be caught in the uptake rapidly in order to shine. Slowness, coldness, dulness or hesitancy in others depressed him just as dull weather depressed him. He did not at all know with what a burning interest his arrival had been awaited, or the effect that his voice had produced and his first appearance. He did not know how the dull schoolgirl had weighed him in a mysterious balance which she herself did not quite comprehend and had found him slightly wanting. Neither could he tell the extent of the paralyses produced in that same mind of hers by the cracked china, the old dish cover, Byrne's awkwardness, and the deboshed crumb-brush. He should have kept to his first impression of her, for first impressions are nearly always right; he should have sought for the reason of so much charm proving charmless, so much positive attraction proving so negative in effect. But he did not. He just took her as he found her and was glad she was gone. "And I believe," said Hennessey, "the South is different now. It used to be all cotton before the war." "Oh, no," said Pinckney. "Before the war there was a lot of cotton grown but we used to grow other things as well, we used to feed ourselves, the plantation was economically independent. The war broke us. We had to get money, so we grew cotton as cotton was never grown before; the South became a great sheet of cotton. You see, cotton is the only crop you can mortgage, so we grew cotton and mortgaged it. Of course the old-time planter is gone, everything is done now by companies, and that's the devil of it--" Pinckney was silent for a moment and sat staring before him as though he were looking at the Past. "Companies, you see, don't grow sunflowers to look at, don't grow trees to shade them, don't make love in a wild and extravagant manner and shoot other companies for crossing them in their affections--don't play the guitar, in short.