Mrs. Lenox came up crying, “Come, my triple alliance, Frank has carried Miss Quincy off to the billiard-room to give her a lesson. Let us go, too, to see that they do not get into mischief.”
Dick hurried away to usurp Mr. Lenox’s place, Madeline tucked her arm through that of Mrs. Lenox, and Norris was left to follow in outer darkness.
When bedtime came, Norris detained Percival.
“Come out for a smoke and a turn,” he said. “The night is frosty, and you’ll sleep all the better for a sniff of fresh air.”
“What are you so glum about?” he asked, as Dick tramped in silence.
He was moody and enraged himself, but too proud to let his anger be seen.
“Not mad, most noble Norris, only thinking.”
“Unfold your thoughts.”
“I was thinking about Madeline,” answered Dick, and Norris’ heart thumped, for he too was thinking about Madeline. “I wonder if the kind of training that she and all girls of her class get is the thing, after all. I’m not talking about knowledge, you understand. I’m not such a cad as to grudge a girl the best there is in the world. But there’s something else. It’s the electric feminine, I suppose, that makes them the powers behind every throne. Fate is always represented in petticoats, you know. It sometimes seems as though the better-trained girls had all that side of them kept out of sight and polished into nothingness. Why are they taught to ignore the biggest power that’s in them? Why, even that untrained little Miss Quincy is vivid with some sex-fascination that the more fortunate girls do not often have.”
“Oh, she is only a colored light. The sunlight has all other colors latent in itself. How do you dare to make any comparison between Miss Quincy and your lovely Miss Elton?”