the whole the exposition had been unsatisfactory. The latter she was
able to grasp, but her mother had admitted an inability exactly to
fix love. One fact, apparently, was clear--it was a nuisance and a
hindrance to happiness, or rather to success. Love upset things.
Still she had the strongest objection possible to living forever
with a man like Mr. Moses Feldt. At once all that she had hoped for
from life grew flat and uninteresting. She had no doubt of her
mother's correctness and wisdom; the world was like that; she must
make the best of it.

There was some telephoning, inquiries, and she heard the elder make
an appointment with a hair-dresser for three that afternoon. She
wondered what it would be like to have your hair permanently waved
and hoped that she would see it done. This, too, she realized, was a
part of the necessity of always considering men--they liked your
hair to be wavy. Hers was as straight and stupid as possible. She,
in turn, examined herself in a mirror: the black bang fell exactly
to her eyebrows, her face had no color other than the carnation of
her lips and her deep blue eyes. She moved away and critically
studied her figure; inches and inches too thin, she decided.
Undoubtedly her mother was right, and she must marry at the first
opportunity--if she could find a man, a rich man, who was willing.

Her thoughts returned vaguely to the mystery, the nuisance, of love.
Surely she had heard something before, immensely important, about
it, and totally different from all her mother had said. Her mind was
filled with the fantastic image of a forest, of dangers, and a fat
china figure with curled plumes, a nodding head, that brushed her
with fear and disgust. A shuddering panic took possession of her,
flashes burned before her eyes, and she ran gasping to the perfumed