"How long have you been in N-?" he demanded.

"Since the first of the year."

"You certainly haven't lost any time. Isn't one in the family enough?" He was sorry the instant he said it. It wasn't anything he really meant, but he felt much too upset to think or speak rationally. Never had Gloria's resemblance to Greg been so close, or so disturbing. Gloria seemed not to have heard him.

"John..."-Gloria moved very close to him, and grasped his hands-"please don't be angry with me. I'm really still the same Gloria, except that I've learned a lot in the last two months." "Yes, I can see that."

"Maybe I've learned quickly because I was ready to know. Anyway, it seems that the things I've understood recently have been just underneath the surface for a long, long time, only waiting for me to see them." She smiled up at John with a sweetness, a poise that he had never remembered seeing in her before. The girl he knew had suddenly become a woman, and he found his anger quickly vanishing under her warmth and slf-assurance.

"When Greg was still alive," she went on, "you often remarked how much we looked alike. And then, when he died, I saw, many times, how this hurt you. Then, after I came to know how it was with you and Greg, I began to understand why this was so, and how you felt about about the promise Greg asked of me." She gripped his arms tightly. "John, I came to Nand I came up here tonight, because I thought..."-she grew very earnest and serious, while her lips trembled and her voice roughened under the intensity of her feeling" . . . I thought, that if... if I came to look very much like Greg and to act very much like Greg, you might... be able to think of me as you did of him..." Swaying towards him, she lowered her eyes, and leaned against his body. John felt himself drowning in a sea of conflicts. An army of hates and loves struck sparks of anguish throughout his whole being, while Gloria stood there humbly, silently waiting... waiting. He knew himself powerless to command the situation... to direct its outcome. Limp and helpless, he let the buffeting waves of emotion have their way with him. His face was raised, with eyes closed, lips set, a giant question stamped upon every feature. Intensely, he thought of Greg, and then he thought of Gloria. And then-just how it happened he never quite knew-the two images, once so separate and far apart, somehow began to melt and merge. Is Greg becoming Gloria? . . . is Gloria becoming Greg? . . . he asked himself in bewilderment. But an instant later, it did not seem to matter, because with a great surge of feeling which swallowed up all doubts and questionings, love came back into his soul. He put his arms around her, and she looked up, then, and saw his face, and her own face reflected the light and love which were written there. With instinctive wisdom, Gloria kept silent. She led him gently towards his small sette and they sat down together, their arms about each other, and remained for a long time, wordlessly.

With a quick, deep insight, Gloria sensed how delicately balanced was John's new emotional direction. She knew that it was for her to break their silence, to help him consolidate their new relationship. There was so much yet to be said, and she wondered whether she could find the words to say it rightly. John sighed, and stirred from his position beside her. He was getting restless, she thought. Whatever was to be said, she must say quickly. She knew he would never again be so receptive to the thoughts which ached within her for expression.

"There's so much I want to tell you, John. First of all, I made Mother and Dad promise not to let you know I had come to N. I didn't want to see you until I was sure of the things I needed to know, and when I first got here, I wasn't sure. I went to work down at the canning plant on "L" Street. I still don't know how I managed to persuade Mother and Dad to let me come. Everyone said it was very wrong of me to be leaving school the semester before my graduation..."

John looked up at her with a wry smile. "You seem to have become very good at persuasion, Gloria." She smiled at the jibe.

"Well," she went on, "almost the first evening after I started work, some of the girls on my line asked me to join them at Leddy's. I was afraid they might question my age, but I must have put up a very good bluff. Anyway, I learned how to sip beer without making a face, and I spent my time talking, and watching, and learning. I soon found out how it was with the boys and girls I saw there, and I wanted to know for myself how people felt who love like you and Greg. I kept on seeing them night after night, in their loves, their disappointments. Finally it seemed to me that they were all running after dreams, rainbows-after something really not outside themselves at all. Then, one night, an older woman started talking to me. She spoke as if she knew much about love, she spoke about thoughts and feelings of love which I had never dreamed. I used to repeat her words over and over again, so I would not forget them. Gloria, she said, a person in love is a person in need, seeking something perfect, something that will make him whole. And whether you have eyes for a beautiful soul, or only a bautiful body, or both-love is still all the same. People seem to love differently, only because they are different in what they love.-Are you listening, John . . .?"

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