you might say. Next time, maybe, we'll
do it. The missus says she wants to go back there every year."

Florian would shake his head. "Oh, you don't want to do that. Have you
been out to Glacier? Have you done the Yellowstone on horseback? Ever
been down the Grand Canyon?"

"Why--no--but----"

"You've got a few thrills coming to you then."

The sunburned traveller would flush mahogany. "That's all right for you
to say. But I'm no chamois. But it was a great trip, just the same. I
want to thank you."

Then, for example, Florian's clothes. He had adopted that careful
looseness--that ease of fit--that skilful sloppiness--which is the last
word in masculine sartorial smartness. In talking he dropped his final
g's and said "sportin'" and "mountain climbin'" and "shootin'." From
June until September he wore those Norfolk things with bow ties, and his
shirt patterns were restrained to the point of austerity. A signet ring
with a large scrolled monogram on the third finger of his right hand was
his only ornament, and he had worn a wrist watch long before the War. He
had never seen a mountain. The ocean meant Coney Island. He breakfasted
at Child's. He spent two hours over the Sunday papers. He was a
Tittlebat Titmouse without the whiskers. And Myra loved him.

If Florian had not pretended to be something he wasn't; and if he had
not professed an enthusiastic knowledge of things of which he was
ignorant, he would, in the natural course of events, have loved Myra
quickly in return. In fact, he would have admitted that he had loved her
first, and desperately. And there would have been no story entitled,
"Ain't Nature Wonderful!"

Myra worked in the women's and misses', third floor, and she didn't care
a thing about the big outdoors or the great open spaces. She didn't even
pretend to--at first. A clear-eyed, white-throated, capable young woman,
almost poignantly pretty. You sensed it was the kind of loveliness that
fades a bit with marriage. In its place come two sturdy babies to carry
on the torch of beauty. You sensed, too, that Myra would keep their
noses wiped, their knees scrubbed, and their buttons buttoned and that,
between a fresh blouse for herself and fresh rompers for them, the
blouse would always lose.

She hated discomfort, did Myra, as does one who has always had too much
of it. After you have stood all day, from 8:30 A. M. to 5:30
P. M., selling sweaters, riding togs, golf clothes, and
trotteurs to athletic