his restlessness, transforming it to a faint glow of hope. Perhaps the future would after all make way for him; perhaps, indeed very likely, it was merely a question of learning a few ropes.
"Have you decided where you're going to spend the summer?" he asked finally. The question had been on his mind for days, but it took whiskey to bring it to his tongue. The Rondes de Printemps was stealing back into his head. Did he really want to go to Paris?
Suddenly it seemed to him absurd to be standing so far away from her. He finished his drink and came to her side. Instantly he rejoiced that he had done so, for Sophie greeted his move, oh so casually, by taking his hand and twisting his fingers in a way that sent warm shivers up his spine.
"What nice nails you have!" she remarked.
He wanted to lean forward on her shoulder and be stroked,—but he was afraid that would be out of character. Men who tossed down glasses of fearfully strong spirits didn't lean forward to be stroked.
"The agent says I can still have that gingerbready house at Pride's Crossing," said Sophie, "the one I looked at. But it's so big and foolish. . . Sometimes I wonder what on earth I came home for. It's all very pointless. I really don't care how many teeth my cousins' babies have cut. And the only alternative to relations is to make new friends, and one's already had so many, and it's so fatiguing to try people out,
