“I mean that girls have more freedom, more experience, more information, more opportunities for comparison, and that the Cynic-Maker, to succeed, has to be vastly cleverer than he used to be.”
“I believe I shall join you in that optimism, though I am inclined to think that by an operation of natural selection he is vastly cleverer than he used to be.”
The Cynic-Maker sat down beside the white duckling at the other end of the veranda.
“Witness,” I said, “the grotesque appositions of life: The Cynic-Maker and the Victim at one end of the stage, and the Spectator with the Left-Over Girl at the Other. Surely we have here some very important elements of a social allegory.”
“And in spite of everything,” mused the Left-Over Girl, “I was going to say just now that I thought marriage was more popular than ever.”
“What makes you think that—I mean in view of the statistics, in view of the census of the unmarried?”
“You must not insist upon participation only as indicating popularity. Take the instance of golf, which few people actually play, but which is the game all the same. I mean that in proportion to the number who do not marry there is less affirmative objection to marriage than in the past.”
“I wish I knew how you make that out. But I am going to take this much from it, and you will correct me if I am wrong: Women are less likely to marry than formerly; but they are also less certain not to marry.”
“Would it cheer you any to believe that?”
“I do not insist upon being cheered. But I should like to know. I am weak enough to want to be confirmed in a belief which I have tried to formulate. You can see that matrimony might get some comfort out of it just as golf does. It might enjoy the flattery of being the greatest game even if every one doesn’t choose to play, even if certain charming women do choose to cover their emotions with a veil of sophistry as they cover their books with brown paper.”