The compensation of a very early success is a conviction that life is a romantic matter. In the best sense one stays young.

After all, life hasn't much to offer except youth, and I suppose for older people, the love of youth in others.

They were stars on this stage, each playing to an audience of two: the passion of their pretense created the actuality. Here, finally, was the quintessence of self-expression-- yet it was probable that for the most part their love expressed Gloria rather than Anthony. He felt often like a scarecly tolerated guest at a party she was giving.

But his heart was in a constant, turbulent riot.

It seemed that the only lover she had ever wanted was a lover in a dream.

Working-girls, in pairs and groups and swarms, loitered by these windows, choosing their future boudoirs from some resplendent display which included even a man's silk pajamas laid domestically across the bed. They stood in front of the jewelry stores and picked out their engagement rings, and their wedding rings and their platinum wrist watches, and then drifted on to inspect the feather fans and opera cloaks; meanwhile digesting the sandwiches and Sundaes they had eaten for lunch.

She smiled, a moving childish smile that was like all the lost youth in the world.