Amongst the passengers on the “Utopia” are two young women from New York. They
travel from Europe back home to New York, where they apparently belong to the high
society and wear the latest fashion from Paris. In “Autres Temps” they represent the
“new” New York, in which divorce and remarriage is no longer an inexcusable social
aberration. Mrs. Lidcote even has the impression that it is fashionable among their
friends to get divorced. The two talk about a friend of them named Leila, who is
probably Leila Barkley, and so it can be assumed that they also represent Leila´s
ideas and attitudes.