"From Massachusetts, dear…. The blue-light elders got on my nerves. I wanted to study music, too, with a view to opera." She laughed unpleasantly.
"Was your home life unhappy, dear?"
"Does a girl leave happiness?"
"You didn't run away, did you?"
"I did—straight to the metropolis as a moth to its candle."
Valerie waited, then, timidly: "Did you care to tell me any more, dear?
I thought perhaps you might like me to ask you. It isn't curiosity."
"I know it isn't—you blessed child! I'll tell you—some day—perhaps…. Pull the rope and set me swinging, please…. Isn't this sky delicious—glimpsed through the green leaves? Fancy you're not knowing the happiness of the country! I've always known it. Perhaps the trouble was I had too much of it. My town was an ancient, respectable, revolutionary relic set in a very beautiful rolling country near the sea; but I suppose I caught the infection—the country rolled, the breakers rolled, and finally I rolled out of it all—over and over plump into Gotham! And I didn't land on my feet, either…. You are correct, Valerie; there is something humorous about this world…. There's one of the jokes, now!" as a native passed, hunched up on the dashboard, driving a horse and a heifer in double harness.
"Shall we go to the post office with him?" cried Valerie, jumping to her feet.
[Illustration: "Valerie sat cross-legged on the grass … scribbling away.">[
"Now, dear, what is the use of our going to the post office when nobody knows our address and we never could possibly expect a letter!"