“A day like this” meant that there was a wind which no one under fifty had any business to know came out of the east, for it arrived from a sky blue as a vast, inverted cup of turquoise.  The sea was a cup, too; a cup of gold glittering where the Esterel mountains rimmed it, and full to the frothing brim of blue spilt by the sky.

Perhaps there was a hint of keenness in the breeze, and the palms in the hotel garden were whispering to each other about it, while they rocked the roses tangled among their fans; yet it seemed to me that the whispers were not of complaint, but of joy—­joy of life, joy of beauty, and joy of the spring.  The air smelled of a thousand flowers, this air that Lady Turnour shunned as if it were poison, and brought me a sense of happiness and adventure fresh as the morning.  I knew I had no right to the feeling, because this wasn’t my adventure.  I was only in it on sufferance, to oil the wheels of it, so to speak, for my betters; yet golden joy ran through all my veins as gaily, as generously, as if I were a princess instead of a lady’s-maid.

Why on earth I was happy, I didn’t know, for it was perfectly clear that I was going to have a horrid time; but I pitied everybody who wasn’t young, and starting off on a motor tour, even if on fifty francs a month “all found.”

I pitied Lady Turnour because she was herself; I pitied Sir Samuel because he was married to her; I pitied the people in the big hotel, who spent their afternoons and evenings playing bridge with all the windows hermetically sealed, while there was a world like this out of doors; and I wasn’t sure yet whether I pitied the chauffeur or not.

He didn’t look particularly sorry for himself, as he took his seat on my right.  I was well out of his way, and he had the air of having forgotten all about me, as he steered away from the hotel down the flower-bordered avenue which led to the street.

“Anyhow,” said I to myself, behind my little three-cornered talc window, “whatever his faults may be, appearances are very deceptive if he ever tries to chuck me under the chin.”

There we sat, side by side, shut away from our pastors and masters by a barrier of glass, in that state of life and on that seat to which it had pleased Providence to call us, together.

“We’re far enough apart in mind, though,” I told myself.  Yet I found my thoughts coming back to the man, every now and then, wondering if his nice brown profile were a mere lucky accident, or if he were really intelligent and well educated beyond his station.  It was deliciously restful at first to sit there, seeing beautiful things as we flashed by, able to enjoy them in peace without having to make conversation, as the ordinary jeune fille must with the ordinary jeune monsieur.

“And is it that you love the automobilism, mademoiselle?”

“But yes, I love the automobilism.  And you?”

“I also.” (Hang it, what shall I say to her next?)