CHAPTER XX.
BACHELOR GIRLS.
IN September Emily, convinced that she could not afford to stay away from her own country longer, got herself transferred to the New York staff and crossed with the Waylands. In the crowd on the White Star pier she saw Joan, now a successful playright or “plagiarist” as she called herself, because the most of her work was translating and adapting. And presently Joan and she were journeying in a four-wheeler piled high with trunks, toward the San Remo where Joan was living.
“Made in Paris,” said Joan, her arm about Emily and her eyes delighting in Emily’s stylish French travelling costume. “You even speak with a Paris accent. How you have changed!”
“But not so much as you. You are not so thin. And you’ve lost that stern, anxious expression. And you have the air—what is it?—the air that comes to people when their merits have been publicly admitted.”
Joan did indeed look a person who is in the habit of being taken into account. She had always been good-looking, if somewhat severe and business-like. Now she was handsome. She was not of the type of woman with whom a man falls ardently in love—she showed too plainly that she dealt with all the facts of life on a purely intellectual basis.
“I’ve been expecting news that you were marrying,” said Emily.
“I?” Joan smiled cynically. “I feel as you do about marriage—except——”
She paused and reddened as Emily began to laugh. “No—not that,” she went on. “I’m not the least in love. But I’ve made up my mind to marry the first intelligent, endurable, self-supporting man that asks me. I’m thirty-two years old and—I want children.”
“Children! You—children?”
“Yes—I. I’ve changed my mind now that I can afford to think of such things. I like them for themselves and—they’re the only hope one has of getting a real object in life. Working for oneself is hollow. I once thought I’d be happy if I got where I am now—mistress of my time and sure of an income. But I find that I can’t hope to be contented going on alone. And that means children.”