1.

　　New York welcomed Jill, as she came out of the Pennsylvania Stationinto Seventh Avenue, with a whirl of powdered snow that touched hercheek like a kiss, the cold, bracing kiss one would expect from thisvivid city. She stood at the station entrance, a tiny figure besidethe huge pillars, looking round her with eager eyes. A wind waswhipping down the avenue. The sky was a clear, brilliant tent of thebrightest blue. Energy was in the air, and hopefulness. She wonderedif Mr Elmer Mariner ever came to New York. It was hard to see howeven his gloom would contrive to remain unaffected by theexhilaration of the place.

　　Yes, New York looked good . . . good and exciting, with all thetaxi-cabs rattling in at the dark tunnel beside her, with all thepeople hurrying in and hurrying out, with all this medley ofstreet-cars and sky-signs and crushed snow and drays and horses andpolicemen, and that vast hotel across the street, towering to heavenlike a cliff. It even smelt good. She remembered an old picture inPunch, of two country visitors standing on the step of their railwaycarriage at a London terminus, one saying ecstatically to other:

　　"Don't speak! Just sniff! Doesn't it smell of the Season!" She knewexactly how they had felt, and she approved of their attitude. Thatwas the right way to behave on being introduced to a greatmetropolis. She stood and sniffed reverently. But for the presence ofthe hurrying crowds, she could almost have imitated the example ofthat king who kissed the soil of his country on landing from hisship.

　　She took Uncle Chris' letter from her bag. He had written from anaddress on East Fifty-seventh Street. There would be just time tocatch him before he went out to lunch. She hailed a taxi-cab whichwas coming out of the station.

　　It was a slow ride, halted repeatedly by congestion of the traffic,but a short one for Jill. She was surprised at herself, a Londoner oflong standing, for feeling so provincial and being so impressed. ButLondon was far away. It belonged to a life that seemed years ago anda world from which she had parted for ever. Moreover, this wasundeniably a stupendous city through which her taxi-cab was carryingher. At Times Square the stream of the traffic plunged into awhirlpool, swinging out of Broadway to meet the rapids which pouredin from east, west, and north. On Fifth Avenue all the automobiles inthe world were gathered together. On the sidewalks, pedestrians,muffled against the nipping chill of the crisp air, hurried to andfro. And, above, that sapphire sky spread a rich velvet curtain whichmade the tops of the buildings stand out like the white minarets ofsome eastern city of romance.

　　The cab drew up in front of a stone apartment house; and Jill,getting out, passed under an awning through a sort of mediaevalcourtyard, gay with potted shrubs, to an inner door. She wasimpressed. The very atmosphere was redolent of riches, and shewondered how in the world Uncle Chris had managed to acquire wealthon this scale in the extremely short space of time which had elapsedsince his landing. There bustled past her an obvious millionaire--or,more probably, a greater monarch of finance who looked down upon meremillionaires and out of the goodness of his heart tried to check atendency to speak patronisingly to them. He was concealed to theeyebrows in a fur coat, and, reaching the sidewalk, was instantlyabsorbed in a large limousine. Two expensive-looking ladies followedhim. Jill began to feel a little dazed. Evidently the tales one heardof fortunes accumulated overnight in this magic city were true, andone of them must have fallen to the lot of Uncle Chris. For nobody towhom money was a concern could possibly afford to live in a placelike this. If Croesus and the Count of Monte Cristo had applied forlodging there, the authorities would probably have looked on them alittle doubtfully at first and hinted at the desirability of amonth's rent in advance.