y quietly late one April afternoon. It rained, I
remember, all that day, but the next was bright and clear for our
sailing. In our small stateroom on the ship we found a note from the
company, a large, engraved impressive affair, presenting their best
wishes and asking us to accept for the voyage one of their most
luxurious cabins.

"This is what comes," said Eleanore gaily, "of being the wife of a
writer."

"Or the daughter," I said softly, "of a very wonderful engineer."

"You darling boy!"

We moved up to a large sunny cabin. I remember her swiftly reading the
telegrams and letters there as though to get them all out of the way. I
remember her unpacking and taking possession of our first home.

"We're married, aren't we," said a voice.

There was only one more good-by to be said. On the deck, as we went out
of the harbor, Eleanore stood by the rail. I felt her hand close tight
on mine and I saw her eyes glisten a little with tears.

"What a splendid place it has been," she said.

CHAPTER XVIII

We found every place splendid in those weeks as we let the wanderlust
carry us on. And as though emerging from some vivid dream, various
places and faces of people stand out in my memory now, as then they
loomed in upon our absorption.

I remember the little old harbor of Cherbourg, gleaming in the
moonlight, where when we landed Eleanore said, "Let's stay here awhile."
So of course we did, and then went on to Paris. We took an apartment,
very French and absurdly small, from a former Beaux Arts friend of mine.
I remember the kindly face of the maid who took such beaming care of us,
the cafe in front of which late at night we sat and watched the huge
shadowy carts go by on their way to the market halls, the sunrise flower
market, where we filled our cab with moss roses and plants, Polin's
songs in the "Ambassadeurs," delicious petites allees in the Bois, our
favorite rides on the tops of the 'buses, that old religious place of
mine down under the bridge by Notre Dame.

All these and more we saw in fragments, now and then, looking out with
vivid interest on all the life around us, only to return to each other,
_into_ each other I should say, for the exploring was quite different
now, there had been such hours between us that nothing intimate could be
held back. Nothing? Well, nothing that I thought of then. For somehow or
other, in those glad, eager afternoons and evenings, in those nights,
nothing disturbi