Editor’s note: This is the second half of this two-part column. The first appeared in Thursday’s edtition.

Now let me tell you something about the American European Express train. And what I say is true not only of this train or this experience. It can happen in the Russian Tea Room, or in the Steinway Piano Showroom, or at the Palm Court at the Plaza Hotel, or standing beneath the mythical expanse of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge. There are some places that, because of the eloquence of their architecture. the elegance of their décor, the inspiration imparted by their atmosphere or the combination of any or all of the above, lift us out of ourselves and make us into more.

One evening when I was new to Manhattan and bursting with an eighteen-year-old’s ecstasy in being alive, I, with similarly minded enthusiasts, was ambling along the promenade by the East River in the Carl Schultz Park.

It was a perfect spring midnight. The air was crystal clear. The skyline had been etched in glass. The river was glistening and silent, and across the river, the lights of Roosevelt Island reflected fat, dazzling dots into the still, black water. Me. My friends. We felt the perfect magic of the night and began singing Tin Pan Alley tunes. We were delightful. We were delirious. We were de-lovely. We started dancing. Doing swan dives up and down park benches. We were young. We were youth. We were exaltation. That night was what life with a capital “L” is all about. Good movies approximate that feeling. At best, they copy it. Art imitates life. Then we imitate art.

But life, that extra special life in those extra special places – at the Plaza Hotel, under the Verrazano Narrows Bridge – life comes first. And those moments of life bring out in us a special edge. They put a patina of gloriousness on our every move.

And so when I sit down at the piano in the St. Moritz club car of the American European Express, and the sun is setting outside the window of my rapidly moving train, I am as young as the eighteen year old girl I used to be, and life has as much potential… and beautiful movie stars are all pale imitations of me… and realization has exceeded expectation… and the train rolls on.

What am I playing?

Just disassociated notes at first. Then they assemble into a melody, and I recognize the tune. It is Bless This House.

Why am I playing that?

“Oh Lord We Pray…”

I’m an atheist.

“Make it Safe by Night and Day…”

I must really like this train.

Charlie is sitting comfortably in a plush pink armchair across the aisle. I segue into Danny Boy, do a few bars of Embraceable You and then lament in ivory about being Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered.

At some point, after bothered and before bewildered, the Chef de Train, Gregg, comes to life beside the piano like a reflection materializing out of a windowpane. It is night. On a train, night isolates. The real world has been imprisoned out there, far removed from us behind a sheet of glass.

We are in motion. Aloof and apart.

Gregg sits on the arm of a chair. We talk. He talks. His Handi-Talkie bulges from the back pocket of his pants, reminding us of his responsibility. But he is relaxed. He tells us about the American European Express. The fascinating conception of its sister train, the Nostalgic Istanbul Orient Express in Zurich. About the location, assemblage and restoration of the cars for the American venture. A bit about the crew, many of whom originated in Florida. A word or two about headquarters in Chicago, where he had relocated. A romantic rags to riches story about Mr. Spann, the president of the American European Express, who had worked his way up in the hospitality industry until now, when he owns a luxurious Florida resort, and is implementing the incredible dream of this Shangri-la on wheels. And sometime in the course of this conversation, the Chief Steward, Tom Gray appears.

Tom is an unusual man. There is a caring about him, and a gentleness. He is obviously good at what he does, or he could not hold such an important position on the train, but he does what he does so unobtrusively that one’s memory of him is not of activity. But rather of the wake of an action, as if with Tom around, you are eating a chocolate bon bon before your sweet tooth even had a chance to ache.

We talk some more, and then both men return to other cars of the train. And other responsibilities.

Charlie and I, too, are nearing the end of our first night. We jostle back through the corridors. Through five, six, seven, eight cars, past our Paris sleeper, and finally arrive at the Bay Point club car, where Mr. Bill presides over his piano.

As we settle into a comfortable art deco sofa, the last of the “anniversary couples” is going to bed. We encounter many of these on the train, and exchange pleasantries with several in passing. They are people in their sixties or seventies, who, forty or fifty years ago, had taken a train with their spouse, and now, half a century later, are re-living that experience.