WHEN DOMINIQUE STEPPED OFF THE TRAIN IN NEW YORK, Wynand was there to meet her. She had not written to him nor heard from him during the weeks of her residence in Reno; she had notified no one of her return. But his figure standing on the platform, standing calmly, with an air of finality, told her that he had kept in touch with her lawyers, had followed every step of the divorce proceedings, had known the date when the decree was granted, the hour when she took the train and the number of her compartment.

He did not move forward when he saw her. It was she who walked to him, because she knew that he wanted to see her walking, if only the short space between them. She did not smile, but her face had the lovely serenity that can become a smile without transition.

“Hello, Gail.”

“Hello, Dominique.”

She had not thought of him in his absence, not sharply, not with a personal feeling of his reality, but now she felt an immediate recognition, a sense of reunion with someone known and needed.

He said: “Give me your baggage checks, I’ll have it attended to later; my car is outside.”

She handed him the checks and he slipped them into his pocket. They knew they must turn and walk up the platform to the exit, but the decisions both had made in advance broke down in the same instant, because they did not turn, but remained standing, looking at each other.

He made the first effort to correct the breach. He smiled lightly.

“If I had the right to say it, I’d say that I couldn’t have endured the waiting had I known that you’d look as you do. But since I have no such right, I’m not going to say it.”

She laughed. “All right, Gail. That was a form of pretense, too—our being too casual. It makes things more important, not less, doesn’t it? Let’s say whatever we wish.”

“I love you,” he said, his voice expressionless, as if the words were a statement of pain and not addressed to her.

“I’m glad to be back with you, Gail. I didn’t know I would be, but I’m glad.”

“In what way, Dominique?”

“I don’t know. In a way of contagion from you, I think. In a way of finality and peace.”

Then they noticed that this was said in the middle of a crowded platform, with people and baggage racks hurrying past.

They walked out to the street, to his car. She did not ask where they were going; and did not care. She sat silently beside him. She felt divided, most of her swept by a wish not to resist, and a small part of her left to wonder about it. She felt a desire to let him carry her—a feeling of confidence without appraisal, not a happy confidence, but confidence. After a while, she noticed that her hand lay in his, the length