"We have rather lost that point of view," Owen guardedly admitted. "You see——" and then he laughed. "It's no use, John; no matter how we put it to you it's a jar. The world's thought has changed—and you have got to catch up!"
"Suppose I refuse? Suppose I really am unable?"
"We won't suppose it for a moment," he said cheerfully. "Ideas are not nailed down. Just take out what you had and insert some new ones. Women are people—just as much as we are; that's a fact, my dear fellow. You'll have to accept it."
"And are men allowed to be people, too?" I asked gloomily.
"Why, of course! Nothing has interfered with our position as human beings; it is only our sex supremacy that we have lost."
"And do you like it?" I demanded.
"Some men made a good deal of fuss at first—the old-fashioned kind, and all the worst varieties. But modern men aren't worried in the least over their position. . . . See here, John, you don't grasp this—women are vastly more agreeable than they used to be."
I looked at him in amazement.
"Fact!" he said. "Of course, we loved our own mothers and daughters and sisters, more or less, no matter how they looked or what they did; and when we were 'in love' there was no limit to the glory of 'the beloved object.' But you and I know that women were pretty unsatisfactory in the old days."
I refused to admit it, but he went on calmly.