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“Did she say that, Paula?”

“Yes. ”

He dusted his hands together, slowly, spiritlessly. His eyes looked pained and dull. “She did, h’m? You say she did?” He was talking to himself, and thinking, thinking.

Pinky, sensing victory, left him. She ran lightly up the cellar stairs, through the first-floor rooms and up to the second floor. Her mother’s bedroom door was open.

A little mauve lamp shed its glow upon the tired woman in one of the plump, grey-enamel beds. “No, I’m not sleeping. Come here, dear. What in the world have you been doing in the cellar all this time?”

“Talking to dad. ” She came over and perched herself on the side of the bed. She looked down at her mother. Then she bent and kissed her. Mrs. Brewster looked incredibly girlish with the lamp’s rosy glow on her face and her hair, warmly brown and profuse, rippling out over the pillow. Scarcely a thread of grey in it. “You know, mother, I think dad isn’t well. He ought to go away. ”

As if by magic the youth and glow faded out of the face on the pillow. As she sat up, clutching her n
ightgown to her breast, she looked suddenly pinched and old. “What do you mean, Pinky! Father—but he isn’t sick. He—”

“Not sick. I don’t mean sick exactly. But sort of worn out. That furnace. He’s sick and tired of the thing; that’s what he said to Fred. He needs a change. He ought to retire and enjoy life. He could. This house is killing both of you. Why in the world don’t you close it up, or sell it, and come to New York?”

“But we do. We did. Last winter—”

“I don’t mean just for a little trip. I mean to live. Take a little two-room apartment in one of the new buildings—near my studio—and relax. Enjoy yourselves. Meet new men and women. Live! You’re in a rut—both of you. Besides, dad needs it. That rheumatism of his, with these Wisconsin winters—”

“But California—we could go to California—”

“That’s only a stop-gap. Get your little place in New York all settled, and then run away whenever you like, without feeling that this great bulk of a house is waiting for you. Father hates it; I know it. ”

“Did he ever say so?”

“Well, practically. He thinks you’re fond of it. He—”

Slow steps ascending the stairs—heavy, painful steps. The two women listened in silence. Every footfall seemed to emphasize Pinky’s words. The older woman turned her face toward the sound, her lips parted, her eyes anxious, tender.

“How tired he sounds,” said Pinky; “and old. And he’s only—why, dad’s only fifty-eight. ”

“Fifty-seven,” snapped Mrs. Brewster sharply, protectingly.

Pinky leaned forward and kissed her. “Good night, mummy dear. You’re so tired, aren’t you?”

Her father stood in the doorway.

“Good night, dear. I ought to be tucking you into bed. It’s all turned around, isn’t it? Biscuits and honey for breakfast, remember. ”

So Pinky went off to her own room (sans“slp cov") and slept soundly, dreamlessly, as does one whose work is well done.

Three days later Pinky left. She waved a good-bye from the car platform, a radiant, electric, confident Pinky, her work well done.

“Au ‘voir!The first of November! Everything begins then. You’ll love it. You’ll be real New Yorkers by Christmas. Now, no changing your minds, remember. ”

And by Christmas, somehow, miraculously, there they were, real New Yorkers; or as real and as New York as anyone can be who is living in a studio apartment (duplex) that has been rented (furnished) from a lady who turned out to be from Des Moines.

When they arrived, Pinky had four apartments waiting for their inspection. She told them this in triumph and well she might, it being the winter after the war when New York apartments were as scarce as black diamonds and twice as costly.