She was trying to explain it to Pete. The sun had risen sinister and hot, climbing into a drowsy haze, and up from a low vague region neither water nor sky clouds like fat little girls in starched frocks marched solemnly.

“It’s a thing they join at that place he’s going to. Only they have to work to join it, and sometimes you don’t even get to join it then. And the ones that do join it don’t get anything except a little button or something.”

“Pipe down and try it again,” Pete told her, leaning with his elbows and one heel hooked backward on the rail, his hat slanted across his reckless dark face, squinting his eyes against the smoke of his cigarette. “What’re you talking about?”

“There’s something in the water,” Jenny remarked with placid astonishment, creasing her belly over the rail and staring downward into the faintly rippled water while the land breeze molded her little green dress. “It must of fell off the boat. . . . Oh, I’m talking about that college he’s going to. You work to join things there. You work three years, she says. And then maybe you—”

“What college?”

“I forgot. It’s the one where they have big football games in the papers every year. He’s—”

“Yale and Harvard?”

“Uhuh, that’s the one she said. He’s—”

“Which one? Yale, or Harvard?”

“Uhuh. And so he—”

“Come on, baby. You’re talking about two colleges. Was it Yale she said, or Harvard? or Sing Sing or what?”

“Oh,” Jenny said. “It was Yale. Yes, that’s the one she said. And he’ll have to work three years to join it. And even then maybe he won’t.”

“Well, what about it? Suppose he does work three years: what about it?”

“Why, if he does, he won’t get anything except a little button or something, even if he does join it, I mean.” Jenny brooded softly, creasing herself upon the rail. “He’s going to have to work for it,” she recurred again in a dull soft amazement. “He’ll have to work three years for it, and even then he may not—”

“Don’t be dumb all your life, kid,” Pete told her.

Wind and sun were in Jenny’s drowsing hair. The deck swept trimly forward, deserted. The others were gathered on the deck above. Occasionally they could hear voices, and a pair of masculine feet were crossed innocently upon the rail directly over Pete’s head. A half-smoked cigarette spun in a small twinkling arc astern. Jenny watched it drop lightly onto the water, where it floated amid the other rubbish that had caught her attention. Pete spun his own cigarette backward over his shoulder, but this one sank immediately, to her placid surprise.

“Let the boy join his club, if he wants,” Pete added. “What kind of a club is it? What do they do?”

“I don’t know. They just join it. You work for it three years, she said. Three years. . . . Gee, by that time you’d be too old to do anything if you got to join it. . . . Three years. My Lord.”

“Sit down and give your wooden leg a rest,” Pete said. “Don’t be a dumbbell forever.” He examined the deck a moment, then without changing his position against the rail he turned his head toward Jenny. “Give papa a kiss.”

Jenny also glanced briefly up the deck. Then she came with a sort of wary docility, raising her ineffable face . . . presently Pete withdrew his face. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

“The matter with what?” said Jenny innocently.

Pete unhooked his heel and he put his arm around Jenny. Their faces merged again and Jenny became an impersonal softness against his mouth and a single blue eye and a drowsing aura of hair.