Hanging round he found not at all difficult; a crowd of little
girls had grown up beautifully, the amazing Sally Carrol foremost
among them; and they enjoyed being swum with and danced with and
made love to in the flower-filled summery evenings--and they all
liked Clark immensely. When feminine company palled there were
half a dozen other youths who were always just about to do
something, and meanwhile were quite willing to join him in a few
holes of golf, or a game of billiards, or the consumption of a
quart of "hard yella licker." Every once in a while one of these
contemporaries made a farewell round of calls before going up to
New York or Philadelphia or Pittsburgh to go into business, but
mostly they just stayed round in this languid paradise of dreamy
skies and firefly evenings and noisy nigger street fairs--and
especially of gracious, soft-voiced girls, who were brought up on
memories instead of money.

The Ford having been excited into a sort of restless resentful
life Clark and Sally Carrol rolled and rattled down Valley Avenue
into Jefferson Street, where the dust road became a pavement;
along opiate Millicent Place, where there were half a dozen
prosperous, substantial mansions; and on into the down-town
section. Driving was perilous here, for it was shopping time;
the population idled casually across the streets and a drove of
low-moaning oxen were being urged along in front of a placid
street-car; even the shops seemed only yawning their doors and
blinking their windows in the sunshine before retiring into a
state of utter and finite coma.

"Sally Carrol," said Clark suddenly, "it a fact that you're
engaged?"