They were bobbing over a bridge now, and a little way beyond she saw the
lighted windows of the great caravansary, the Astor House. It smacked of
old New York, where in a few weeks she would be stepping back into the
dull routine of hospital work.
She paid the ricksha boy and ran into the lobby, stamping her feet and
shaking the umbrella. The slicker was an overhead affair, and she had to
take off her hat to get free. This act tumbled her hair about
considerably, and Jane Norman's hair was her glory. It was the tint of the
copper beech, thick, finespun, with intermittent twists that gave it a
wavy effect.
Jane was not beautiful; that is, her face was not--it was comely. It was
her hair that turned male heads. It was then men took note of her body.
She was magnificently healthy, and true health is a magnet as powerful as
that of the true pole. It drew toward her men and women and children. Her
eyes were gray and serious; her teeth were white and sound. She was
twenty-four.
There was, besides her hair, another thing that was beautiful--her voice.
It answered like the G string of an old Strad to every emotion. One could
tell instantly when she was merry or sad or serious or angry. She could
not hide her emotions any more than she could hide her hair. As a war
nurse she had been adored by the wounded men and fought over by the
hospital commandants. But few men had dared make love to her. She had that
peculiar gift of drawing and repelling without consciousness.
As the Chinese boy got her things together Jane espied the bookstall.
American newspapers and American magazines! She packed four or five of
each under her arm, nodded to the boy, and followed the manager to the
lift! She hoped the lights would hang so that she could lie in bed and
read. Her brain was thirsty for a bit of romance.
Humming, she unpacked. She had brought one evening gown, hoping she might
have a chance to wear it before it fell apart from disuse. She shook out
the wrinkles and hung the gown in the closet. Lavender! She raised a fold
of the gown and breathed in rapturously that homy perfume. She sighed.
Perhaps she would have to lay away all her dreams in lavender.
A little later she sat before the dressing mirror, combing her hair. How
it happened she never could tell, but she heard a crash upon the wood
floor, and discovered her hand mirror shattered into a thousand
splinters.