ggs in the open.
She got her face and hands smudged and her hair tumbled, and she forgot
all about enunciating clearly and holding her poses. So abandoned was she
to what Harold called her "bourgeois mood" that she was conscious of
nothing but the sheer joy of living.

Often when she and Quin were alone together, she longed to take him into
her confidence. She was desperately in need of counsel, and his level
head and clear judgments had solved more than one problem for her. But
she realized that, in spite of the heroic effort he was making to keep
within bounds, he was nevertheless liable to overflow into sentiment with
the slightest encouragement. Confession of her proposed flight, moreover,
involved an explanation of her relation to Harold Phipps, and upon that
point Quin could not be counted to sympathize.

With the first of November came a letter that brought matters to a
crisis. Claude Martel wrote that he must know immediately the date of her
arrival in New York, since the place he had bespoken for her at the
Kendall School of Expression could no longer be held open; he must also
give a definite answer about the apartment.

Eleanor received the letter one Saturday as she was starting to a tea.
All afternoon she listened to the local chatter about her as a lark
poised for flight might listen to the twittering of house sparrows. Her
mind was in a ferment of elation and doubt, of trepidation and joyful
anticipation. The moment she had longed for and yet dreaded was at hand.

Returning across Central Park in the dusk, she rehearsed what she was
going to say to her grandmother. The moment for approaching her had never
seemed more propitious. Ever since she had accepted Quin's advice and
"cottoned up" to the old lady, relations between them had been amazingly
amicable. Her willingness to stay at home in the evening and take Miss
Enid's place as official reader and amanuensis had placed her in high
favor, and Madam, not to be outdone in magnanimity, had allowed her many
privileges.

Now that there seemed some ground for the hope that she might gain her
grandmother's consent to the New York proposition, Eleanor realized how
ardently she wanted it. It was not the money alone, it was her moral
support and approval--hers and Aunt Isobel's. Aunt Enid would understand,
had understood in a way; so would Uncle Ranny and Aunt Flo. As for Quin
Graham----

She heard a cough near by, and turning saw a couple sitting on a benc