2
" Well, we spent enough on gymnastics.''Christ, did we,' said Maureen. 'So many lessons.'So many lessons, it was true: art and music and ice-skating; Lily's every fleeting interest enthusiastically, abundantly indulged. Not to mention the many more practical investments--chemistry tutoring when she struggled, English enrichment when she excelled, SAT courses to propel her to the school and then, presumably, the career of her dreams. What costs had been sunk, what objections had been suppressed, to deliver their daughter into the open and waiting arms of her beautiful life. "
3
" You see, Monsieur, it's worth everything, isn't it, to keep one's intellectual liberty, not to enslave one'spowers of appreciation, one's critical independence? It was because of that that I abandoned journalism, andtook to so much duller work: tutoring and private secretaryship. There is a good deal of drudgery, of course;but one preserves one's moral freedom, what we call in French one's quant a soi. And when one hears goodtalk one can join in it without compromising any opinions but one's own; or one can listen, and answer itinwardly. Ah, good conversation--there's nothing like it, is there? The air of ideas is the only air worthbreathing. And so I have never regretted giving up either diplomacy or journalism--two different forms of thesame self-abdication." He fixed his vivid eyes on Archer as he lit another cigarette. " Voyez-vous, Monsieur,to be able to look life in the face: that's worth living in a garret for, isn't it? But, after all, one must earnenough to pay for the garret; and I confess that to grow old as a private tutor--or a `private' anything--is almostas chilling to the imagination as a second secretaryship at Bucharest. Sometimes I feel I must make a plunge:an immense plunge. Do you suppose, for instance, there would be any opening for me in America-- in NewYork? "