Rules of Civility

The 1930s . . .

What a grueling decade that was.

I was sixteen when the began, just old enough to have had all my dreams and expectations duped by the effortless glamour of the twenties. It was as if America launched the Depression just to teach a lesson.

After the , you couldn't hear the bodies hitting the pavement, but there was a sort of communal gasp and then a stillness that fell over the city like snow. The bands laid down their instruments and the crowds made quietly for the door.

... Poverty and powerlessness. Hunger and hopelessness. At least until the omen of war began to lighten our step.

Eve Ross . . .

Eve was one of those surprising beauties from the .

In New York it becomes so easy to assume that the city's most alluring women have flown in from Paris or . But they're just a minority. A much larger covey hails from the stalwart states that begin with the letter I—like Iowa and Indiana and Illinois. Bred with just the right amount of fresh air, roughhousing, and ignorance, these primitive blondes set out from the cornfields looking like starlight with limbs. Every morning in early spring one of them skips off her porch with a sandwich wrapped in cellophane ready to flag down the first headed to —this city where all things beautiful are welcomed and measured and, if not immediately adopted, then at least tried on for size.