A cynical to surgical postlude on an affair patterns the earlier (1953) In Love and is again an effective, shamefaced self-exposure. He is a writer, who has achieved a moderate success and a certain compromise with a meaningless marriage; she is a stray, defenseless and defeated after five years away from home in Hollywood- that indifferent city. Pulling her out of the water, at a beach party, he salvages her a second time when he extends the relationship. Always guarded, limiting the feelings he offers her- permits himself, the news that his wife is joining him in Hollywood prompts her piqued confessional, a sodden evening, and finally the second self-destructive attempt from which he retreats, unceremoniously.... A small story of passion pursued without a greater love or the courage of commitment, this is intimate, disconsolate, acute.