To try this experiment, she put into a matrix, in place of numbers, real things from the world, things for which she had a certain affinity. For example, in one matrix she put parrots, old opera capes, excellent cigarettes, and cinnamon sticks. In another she put a deck of cards, a forest, bread and a bicycle.

Then, with the superb precision for which mathematicians are known, she fitted the matrices together to see what would come of it. And sure enough, right there in her study, she saw before her on the paper of her calculations, as in a vision, herself. She was in the forest practicing a bewildering yet harmonious series of circus tricks: wearing an operator cape, with a parrot on her shoulder, she did card tricks and smoked a cigarette with great relish, all as she rode around on a bicycle; only then to leap from the bicycle and begin to juggle cinnamon sticks.

Never had she felt so exuberantly mathematical.