“I wanted to see where she went, so I followed. And what do you think! After following a winding trail for a little time, I came, just where the cottonwoods are tallest, upon the strangest sort of dwelling—if it was a dwelling at all—I have ever seen.”
“What was it like?” Jeanne leaned eagerly forward.
“Like nothing on land or sea, but a little akin to both. The door was heavy and without glass. It had a great brass knob such as you find on the cabin doors of very old ships. And the windows, if you might call them that, looked like portholes taken from ships.
“But the walls; they were strangest of all. Curious curved pillars rose every two or three feet apart, to a considerable height. Between these pillars brick walls had been built. The whole was topped by a roof of green tile.”
“And the girl went in there?”
“Where else could she have gone?”
“And that was her home?”
“Who could doubt it?”
“America—” Jeanne drew a long breath. “Your America is a strange place.”
“So strange that even we who have lived here always are constantly running into the most astonishing things.