She smoked her cigarette for a few moments.

He lighted a cigarette himself. He felt uncomfortable and at a loss. As she sat there, and with everything else in the world put aside, she was something that no man with a proper supply of hormones could have been cold to. But everything else in the world couldn’t be put aside quite like that...

“You know,” she said, “this is a hell of a life.”

“It must be,” he agreed.

“I’ve been watching it. I can think a little bit. You saw what happened this afternoon. I mean—”

“The blonde at the Tennis Club?”

“Yes... Well, it just happened that she was a blonde. She could just as well have been a brunette.”

“And then — Esther starts packing.”

“That’s what it amounts to.”

“But it’s been fun while it lasted, and maybe you take something with you.”