Tod is recollecting the approximate one week he and Buz have known famed Broadway actress Arline Simms, that one week which now seems like a lifetime. Working at a copper mine in Butte, Montana, Tod and Buz are rooming at a boarding house run by Lydia Sullivan, Arline's aunt, when Arline "comes home", abandoning her current Broadway success without a word to anyone. When they met her at the boarding house which is where Arline grew up when it was a private home, both Tod and Buz were immediately attracted to her, even before knowing who she is, but Buz believed he had a better handle on her as a person. Namely, he knew that she, for whatever reason, felt like she needed to escape the microscope under which she was existing in New York City, and came home to grasp onto something in her past for emotional stability, more difficult now as both her parents are deceased. Tod, however, ended up getting a better handle on her and what she needed. Tod believed what she needed was a casual relationship with Buz, who tried to renegotiate the terms without knowing the full story.
—Huggo