She began to muse on the woods in late summer, her woods, when their foliage was heaviest, already yellowing a little here and there, with premature splashes of scarlet and wine colour on a still-green maple, like the first white lock in a young woman's hair … Of days on Thundertop, sunrise dips in the forest pool, long hours of dreaming on the rocky summit above the Hudson—how beautiful it had been that morning when she had stood there with young Weston, and they had watched light return to the world with a rending of vapours, a streaming of radiances, like the first breaking of life out of chaos! "He felt it too—I could see it happening all over again in his eyes," she thought; those eyes had seen it with hers. Perhaps that was why, when he recited his poetry to her, in spite of his shyness and his dreadful drawl, she had fancied she heard the authentic note… . Had she been mistaken? She didn't know. But surely not about the story Lewis had brought home the other day. She was sure that was the real thing; and she was glad Lewis had felt it too, felt it at once—she was always glad when they saw things together. Perhaps the boy was going to be a great discovery; a triumph for Lewis, a triumph for The Hour! She remembered that as she leaned back against the mossy edge of the pool the pointed leaf shadows flickered across his forehead and seemed to crown it like a poet's… . Poor little raw product of a standardized world, perhaps never to be thus laurelled again! …

She turned and wandered back to the fire, gazing, as she went, at the books her own hands had arranged and catalogued with such eager care. "What I want today is the book that's never been written," she thought; and then: "No, my child, what you really want is an object in life… ." She was grimly amused to find that she was talking to herself as so often, mentally, she talked to her husband… .

Oh, well—it was nearly dusk already; one more day to tick off the calendar; and at five there was a concert at the Vanguard Club—something new and exotic, of course; she'd mislaid the programme… . She went to her room and pulled out her smart black coat with the gray fur, and the close black turban that made her face look long and narrow and interesting. There were sure to be amusing people at the concert… .

The concert was dull; the amusing people were as boring as only the amusing can be; Halo came home late and out of sorts to find a long-distance from her husband saying he was going to Boston that night, and she was to notify the office that he would not reappear till Monday… .