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 and end by accepting two or three who are at best only pis aller's."

"Sophie dear, was I a pis aller?"

Their fingers were now quietly interlaced, palm against palm.

"You," she said, "are the Good the ill wind blew me."

"And not one of those little almosts—that life is so desperately full of?"

She patted his hand. "You're almost a quite!" Turning grave again, she rested her head against the back of the sofa. "In fact you're the Element,—and it's rare enough,—that saves one's native land from being a howling wilderness. . . For two pins I'd clear out, and find myself a houselet somewhere on the Bay of Biscay."

Grover's thoughts plunged ahead. He was not only committed and resigned to the future now, but impatient for it. "Would the Element be allowed to run down from Paris once in a while and—walk on your beach?"

"Has it never occurred to you," she said, "that people who may know each other fairly well in cities have to start at new beginnings—on beaches?"

He buried his head on her shoulder.

"Aside from that," she went on, "the Element, if it's worth its salt, will be absorbed in its painting,—perhaps in its models, who knows?"

"You needn't be horrid," he said, drawing away.