Owen gazed at me with an expression very like Nellie's.
"There it is," he said. "You can only think about women in some sort of relation to men, of a change in marriage relations as merely a change in kind; whereas what has happened is a change in degree. We still have monogamous marriages, on a much purer and more lasting plane than a generation ago; but the word 'wife' does not mean what it used to."
"Go on—I can't follow you at all."
"A 'wife' used to be a possession; 'wilt thou be mine?' said the lover, and the wife was 'his.'"
"Well—whose else is she now?" I asked with some sharpness.
"She does not 'belong' to anyone in that old sense. She is the wife of her husband in that she is his true lover, and that their marriage is legally recorded; but her life and work does not belong to him. He has no right to her 'services' any more. A woman who is in a business—like Hallie, for instance—does not give it up when she marries."
I stopped him. "What! Isn't Hallie married?"
"No—not yet."
"But—that is her flat?"
"Yes; why not?" He laughed at me. "You see, you can't imagine a woman having a home of her own. Hallie is twenty-three. She won't marry for some years, probably; but she has her position and is doing excellent work. It's only a minor inspectorship, but she likes it. Why shouldn't she have a home?"