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to spot. Unless you yearn to make the acquaintance of more gentlemen like Sgt. O'Malley, you'll set out tomorrow."
          She recognized his joke about O'Malley. Her face relaxed.
          "Well, then."
          Her shoulders firmed. Her hands returned to the steering wheel. Billy McCarthy let out a sigh.
     
    ***
     
          "Right over there's the man I want to meet." Aggie put her rouged lips carefully to a paper straw and sipped her lemon phosphate from its silvery holder. Her eyes were fixed on the profile of a man in a cream colored suit six tables away.
          The dining room at the Essex Hotel was swanky. Its prices were high, its sandwiches mediocre. But although some of its tables were occupied by the stuffy crowd staying at the resort, it had become absolutely the place for the smart young set to take tea.
          Kitty Thorne looked over her nearly bare shoulder. Her yellow chemise was vaguely reminiscent of a Grecian gown. Aggie's was cut quite similarly, but in black. Otherwise they might never have let her out of the house, Aggie thought petulantly.
          Kate could take the car when it suited her. Kate could wander about amusing herself without so much as inviting Aggie. Kate could do anything she pleased, it seemed. Well, Aggie would show her! Kitty Thorne had her own car. She'd thought it was simply the berries when Aggie called and suggested having tea at the Essex. They'd raced two other struggle buggies on the road up the shore and had won both times.
          "In the spiffy suit with the black hair?" Kitty asked licking her fingers and smoothing the spit curl hugging her right cheek. "That's Felix Garvey."
          "I know."
          "He's ever so much older than you. Twenty-seven at least."
          Aggie shrugged.
          Kitty waggled her fingers at Velmont Hatch, who was really a darb even though he appeared to be squiring his younger sister this afternoon. She lowered her voice to impart what she obviously thought a delicious tidbit.
          "They say he works for a man who makes piles of money in businesses you can't talk about."
          "I know."
          Aggie toyed with a long strand of jet beads. Their dark shine matched the beads on the spray of osprey feathers decorating one side of her head.
          "But he's too, too handsome. And he drives the hugest car. And — he looks exciting. I'll die if I don't find a way to meet him."
          "Aggie, you wouldn't!"
          "Why not? All the boys we know are so utterly boring."
          Kitty's expression was openly admiring. It warmed Aggie. At home, Kate got all the praise. For being smart. For inventing silly games for Woody. Even for dressing up like an ordinary human being. No one in the family ever applauded what Aggie did.
          The waiter brought their check.
          "Could you?" asked Kitty with a vague gesture of her cigarette holder. "I'm so utterly, utterly broke."
          Aggie swallowed. All at once she felt guilty at coming here when all their money was gone and they were even going to lose their house. But they couldn't let people know. It would be too embarrassing. Besides, she ought to treat. Kitty had driven.
          Her gaze slid back to Felix Garvey. He didn't worry about money. You could tell it by the way he moved; the way the two girls with him clung to his every word and waiters hurried to his side as soon as he raised an eyebrow.
          She played with her jet beads, swaying them gently. Her finger looped through them and tightened in thought.
          When she and Kitty took their departure a few moments later, Aggie set course not toward the nearest door, but toward one which would take them past Felix Garvey's table.
          Behind her she heard Kitty's gasp.
          Aggie favored her with a provocative smile. Her black chemise shimmied around her with every step. Her breathing was hard to control. Felix Garvey half