The Mulberry Bush by Helen Topping Miller

the Tropic of Cancer, nice ladies did not go out casually to dine with men. They lived, precious and protected, behind their lattices—or was that all ended, too, along with so many other taboos?
    She put on the tweed suit with the soft, gray fur that Mike had insisted on buying for her in New York. She fastened at the throat of her blouse the clip Mike had tossed into her lap that last morning.
    â€œPresent for a pretty lady.”
    It was an expensive clip with four small diamonds set in an original arrangement of enameled grapes. Securing it firmly, she turned her mind as firmly away from a vagrant thought of that girl in New York who had a ring. A girl with pride, she decided, would have sent a ring back when an affair ended. She refused to let herself consider the fact that for the girl, it might not have been ended—not till the abrupt shock came of learning that Mike had married someone else.
    â€œIf she clung, it was her own fault!”
    There might be no truth in it anyway; it might be merely the malicious invention of a man whom Mike hated. At any rate, the clip was lovely, and the cool feel of it against her skin was like a caress from Mike. And the little gray hat that completed the outfit looked smart and sophisticated on her bright hair. Bruce Gamble rose from a sofa in the lobby to meet her, admiration evident in his eyes.
    Without his hat he looked a little older than she had thought him to be, the strong wave of his hair was definitely graying, and at the temples it was white against the dark tan of his skin. “This is fine,” he said, “I was dreading this long evening. Tomorrow I’ll be at work, and the hours move along a little faster when you’re working.” He pulled out her chair and arranged her fur, sat down opposite, and smiled at her.
    â€œNice of you to invite me down,” she said. “Otherwise I’d have had an omelet on a tray, and written a few letters—”
    â€œAnd then you’d have gone to bed at nine o’clock with a magazine and wondered how in a city of half a million people, one room could be crowded so full of loneliness.”
    â€œYou’ve been traveling a long time, haven’t you? I’m very new at it. I wouldn’t be here at all, except that my lady employer broke some bones, and very frankly I’m scared to death.”
    â€œI don’t go around with an order book—and a collection of barroom stories,” he said. “I’m a sort of liaison man between the laboratories and the customers. Right now, I’m anxious to see these demonstrations of our explosive. It’s supposed to eliminate dust and gas and several other dangerous features of other mining explosives. I’m especially interested in this formula because I helped work it out.”
    â€œI,” Virginia said, “sell nice old ladies the idea that their lives will be incomplete until they’ve seen the sun set behind Pelée. And I convince retired businessmen in Nebraska that they should take their wives to Lake Louise or Bermuda. I collect tired schoolteachers and persuade them that a month in a log lodge at St. Vran will bring romance and glamour into their frustrated lives. And then I sell the hotels and camps the argument that they can take these people at a certain rate, so that our bureau can show a margin of profit. Tomorrow, I’m seeing a hotel-keeper near Pike’s Peak and a transportation company, and the next day a dude-ranch owner near the Wyoming border. And the day after that—”
    â€œThe day after that is Sunday. Do you also beard tavern-keepers in their lairs on Sunday?”
    â€œI have a very special one saved for Sunday. He keeps tavern in an old mining town that was once very rich and arrogant and wild. Now it’s historic only—but we’re sending some dilettante university people up there in July.”
    â€œI know the place, I think.” He named it and she