She rubbed her cheek against his. "Now we must run," she said. She quickly turned back to the shadow of the board-walk, to draw on her stockings and shoes, kneeling on the sand like the simple maid of the ballads which she had been envying. They tramped along the board-walk, with heels clicking like castanets, conscious that the world was hushed in night's old enchantment. As they had answered to companionship with the humble picnic-parties among the dunes, so now they found it amusing to dine among the semi-great and the semi-motorists at the Nassau. Ruth had a distinct pleasure when T. Wentler, horse-fancier, aviation enthusiast, president of the First State Bank of Sacramento, came up, reminded Carl of their acquaintanceship at the Oakland-Berkeley Aero Meet, and begged Ruth and Carl to join him, his wife, and Senator Leeford, for coffee. As they waited for their train, quiet after laughter, Ruth remarked: "It was jolly to play with the Personages. You haven't seen much of the frivolous side of me. It's pretty important. You don't know how much soul satisfaction I get out of dancing all night and playing tennis with flanneled oafs and eating _marrons glacés_ and chatting in a box at the opera till I spoil the entire evening for all the German music-lovers, and talking to all the nice doggies from the Tennis and Racquet Club whenever I get invited to Piping Rock or Meadow Brook or any other country club that has ancestors. I want you to take warning." "Did you really miss Piping Rock much to-day?". "No--but I might to-morrow, and I might get horribly bored in our cabin in the Rockies and hate the stony old peaks, and long for tea and scandal in a corner at the Ritz." "Then we'd hike on to San Francisco; have tea at the St. Francis or the Fairmont or the Palace; then beat it for your Hawaii and fireflies in the bush." "Perhaps, but suppose, just suppose we were married, and suppose the Touricar didn't go so awfully well, and we had to be poor, and couldn't go running away, but had to stick in one beastly city flat and economize! It's all very well to talk of working things out together, but think of not being able to have decent clothes, and going to the movies every night--ugh! When I see some of the girls who used to be so pretty and gay, and they went and married poor men--now they are so worn and tired and bedraggled and perambulatorious, and they worry about Biddies and furnaces and cabbages, and their hair is just scratched together, with the dubbest hats--I'd rather be an idle rich." "If we got stuck like that, I'd sell out and we'd hike to the mountain cabin, anyway, say go up in the Santa Lucias, and keep wild bees." "And probably get stung--in the many subtle senses of that word. And I'd have to cook and wash. That would be fun _as_ fun, but to have to do it----" "Ruth, honey, let's not worry about it now, anyhow. I don't believe there's much danger. And don't let's spoil this bully day."