It was typical of the muddle and confusion of their lives that on
the October night when Anthony reported at the Grand Central Station for
the journey to camp, she arrived only in time to catch his eye over the
anxious heads of a gathered crowd. Through the dark light of the
enclosed train-sheds their glances stretched across a hysterical area,
foul with yellow sobbing and the smells of poor women. They must have
pondered upon what they had done to one another, and each must have
accused himself of drawing this sombre pattern through which they were
tracing tragically and obscurely. At the last they were too far away for
either to see the other's tears.
BOOK THREE
CHAPTER I
A MATTER OF CIVILIZATION
At a frantic command from some invisible source, Anthony groped his way
inside. He was thinking that for the first time in more than three years
he was to remain longer than a night away from Gloria. The finality of
it appealed to him drearily. It was his clean and lovely girl that he
was leaving.
They had arrived, he thought, at the most practical financial
settlement: she was to have three hundred and seventy-five dollars a
month--not too much considering that over half of that would go in
rent--and he was taking fifty to supplement his pay.
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