"Therese," said a voice near her. "Do you like champagne?"

Therese turned and saw Genevieve Cranell. "Of course."

"Of course. Well, toddle up to six-nineteen in a few minutes. That's my suite. We're having an inner circle party later."

"I feel very honored," Therese said.

"So don't waste your thirst on highballs. Where did you get that lovely dress?"

"Bonwit's—it's a wild extravagance."

Genevieve Cranell laughed. She wore a blue woolen suit that actually looked like a wild extravagance. "You look so young, I don't suppose you'll mind if I ask how old you are."

"I'm twenty-one."

She rolled her eyes. "Incredible. Can anyone still be only twenty-one?"

People were watching the actress. Therese was flattered, terribly flattered, and the flattery got in the way of what she felt, or might feel, about Genevieve Cranell.

Miss Cranell offered her cigarette case. "For a while, I thought you might be a minor."

"Is that a crime?"

The actress only looked at her, her blue eyes smiling, over the flame of her lighter. Then as the woman turned her head to light her own cigarette, Therese knew suddenly that Genevieve Cranell would never mean anything to her, nothing apart from this half hour at the cocktail party, that the excitement she felt now would not continue, and not be evoked again at any other time or place. What was it that told her? Therese stared at the taut line of her blond eyebrow as the first smoke rose from her cigarette, but the answer was not there. And suddenly a feeling of tragedy, almost of regret, filled Therese. [...]