"That is better," she exclaimed; folded up her discarded underwear, put it into the suit-case, which she then replaced on the rack.
She then began on her coiffure. She detached a series of little curls from over her ears, and twisting the wires on which they were made into hooks, she suspended them from the netting of the rack, where over her head they swung to and fro with the movement of the train.
"Maintenant," she said, "on est plus à son aise. Besides," she added, with the instinct of true French economy, "it does so spoil one's clothes if one takes a long railway journey in them."
The act had been performed with naturalness, and in view of the heat of the night we could not help envying the French girl for her good sense in making the long journey as comfortable as possible.
She began to tell Jan the story of her life. "Mother was a nuisance," she said; "she made life a little bit of hell at home. Well, one day we had a fine old flare-up. I told mother that she could go to the devil if she liked, and I just packed up and ran away. I came down to Madrid, and on the whole I haven't done so badly. I send mother about eight hundred pesetas a month. Most of that she'll keep for me, and I'll have a nice little sum to start business with when I get back. Of course one can't keep up a quarrel with one's mother for ever. Hein!"
Jan asked her how long she had been in Spain.
"Four months," she answered.
"You speak very good Spanish," said Jan.
"Oh," she answered, with a touch of desperation in her voice, "one can't be all day doing nothing. It's a distraction learning something new."