Istra
sat on the bedside nursing her knee. She burst out:
"O Mouse dear, I'm so bored by everybody--every sort of
everybody.... Of course I don't mean you; you're a good pal....
Oh--Paris is _too_ complex--especially when you can't quite get
the nasal vowels--and New York is too youthful and earnest; and
Dos Puentes, California, will be plain hell.... And all my
little parties--I start out on them happily, always, as naive as
a kiddy going to a birthday party, and then I get there and find
I can't even dance square dances, as the kiddy does, and go
home--Oh damn it, damn it, damn it! Am I shocking you? Well,
what do I care if I shock everybody!"
Her slim pliant length was flung out along the bed, and she was
crying. Her beautiful hands clutched the corners of a pillow
bitterly.
He crept over to the bed, patting her shoulder, slowly and
regularly, too frightened of her mood even to want to kiss her.
She looked up, laughing tearfully. "Please say, `There, there,
there; don't cry.' It always goes with pats for weepy girls, you
know.
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