“I never thought goodness was a charm,” she objected.
“And that’s just what I hope you will never find out.”
She laughed. “I don’t believe there’s much danger,” she said. “I think I shall go on being wicked and mercenary and selfish to the day of my death, and probably getting everything I want.”
“I hope not. I mean I hope you won’t get what you want.”
“Oh, why are you so unkind?”
“Because I shall want to use you as a terrible example to my grandchildren.”
“Do you think you will remember me as long as that?”
“I feel no doubt about it.”
She smiled. “It seems rather hard that I have to come to a bad end just to oblige your horrid little grandchildren,” she said. “As a matter of fact, I shall probably run them down in my motor as they go to work with their little dinner-pails. And as I take their mangled forms to the hospital, I’ll murmur: ‘Riatt, Riatt, I think I once knew a half-hearted reformer of that name.’”
“You think you, too, will remember as long as that?”