er
twice a year for ten years. If there's anything I can tell you, just
ask. The first buying trip to Paris is hard until you know the ropes. Of
course you love this town?"

Sophy Gold sat silent a moment, hesitating. Then she turned a puzzled
face toward Miss Morrissey.

"What do people mean when they say they love Paris?"

Ella Morrissey stared. Then a queer look came into her face--a pitying
sort of look. The shrewd eyes softened. She groped for words.

"When I first came over here, ten years ago, I--well, it would have been
easier to tell you then. I don't know--there's something about
Paris--something in the atmosphere--something in the air. It--it makes
you do foolish things. It makes you feel queer and light and happy. It's
nothing you can put your finger on and say 'That's it!' But it's there."

"Huh!" grunted Sophy Gold. "I suppose I could save myself a lot of
trouble by saying that I feel it; but I don't. I simply don't react to
this town. The only things I really like in Paris are the Tomb of
Napoleon, the Seine at night, and the strawberry tart you get at Vian's.
Of course the parks and boulevards are a marvel, but you can't expect me
to love a town for that. I'm no landscape gardener."

That pitying look deepened in Miss Morrissey's eyes.

"Have you been out in the evening? The restaurants! The French women!
The life!"

Sophy Gold caught the pitying look and interpreted it without
resentment; but there was perhaps an added acid in her tone when she
spoke.

"I'm here to buy--not to play. I'm thirty years old, and it's taken me
ten years to work my way up to foreign buyer. I've worked. And I wasn't
handicapped any by my beauty. I've made up my mind that I'm going to buy
the smoothest-moving line of French lingerie and infants' wear that
Schiff Brothers ever had."

Miss Morrissey checked her.

"But, my dear girl, haven't you been round at all?"

"Oh, a little; as much as a woman can go round alone in Paris--even a
homely woman. But I've been disappointed every time. The noise drives me
wild, to begin with. Not that I'm not used to noise. I am. I can stand
for a town that roars, like Chicago. But this city yelps. I've been
going round to the restaurants a little. At noon I always picked the
restaurant I wanted, so long as I had to pay for the lunch of the
_commissionnaire_ who was with me anyway. Can you imagine any man at
home letting a woman pay for his meals the way those shrimpy Frenchmen
do